Landmines? go plant some flowers

[JPicasso]

Cool huh?

http://www.nature.com/nsu/040126/040126-10.html

[venerable bede]

What I want to know is :

How do you sow the seeds ?

[wossname]

Err, presumeably the same way as the flowers do it! Just throw a shedload of seeds up in the air!

[vbNeo]

When you want to clear a mine field, you plant theese bastards and wait till next year to see if there are any mines nearby(they have to grow, right ?)

[wossname]

I reckon it'd be more useful to plant fast growing plants taht cover the surface of a field with a dense mat of wooden stems and then send heavy roots down to trigger off the mines and therefore dampening the explosion!

That would be worth seeing, not a bunch of weeds that go pink when they smell mines farting.

[si_the_geek]

I prefer the way the british army do it. they have something known as a "snake" (I dont know the proper name), which is basically a small rocket tied to the back of a tank, with a great big heavy net attached.

they fire the rocket across the mine field, which spins as it goes (spreading the net), when the net lands all of the mines go off; then it is winched back. The entire process takes about 30 seconds

Admittedly it will only take out vehicle mines, but a lighter version could do personnel mines

[vbNeo]

I like the good ol' WW2 mine clearer - it was actually a 'harvester' alike thingie, with chains on it that rotated rather fast, and exploded the mines when it hit the ground, just put a sucker like that on a sherman and you're off!

The picture isn't exactly it, but it's close

[BodwadUK]

Cabbage and sprout used by rolling them would work wonders cabbages could be dropped in bulk from 200 feet and hit the deeper mines on impact.

THE SMELL WOULD BE BAD THOUGH