Question: What the best wax you have found so far, and how long does it take to grow with that wax ?

Amelia Frizell-Armitage answered on 9 Mar 2014:

Good question!

I wouldn’t say that any one type of wax is the best – the type of wax that is best for the plant depends very much on the environment that the plant is in. A good way of thinking about this is to compare the plant wax to the clothes that you wear. If you live in a country that is hot and sunny all the time, a t-shirt and shorts is the best thing, whereas if you live somewhere cold and snowy like the arctic you need thick warm clothes to stay alive.

A plant that grows in a hot and dry environment will need to have a thick layer of wax. The thicker the wax the less water the plant will lose, and also the more sunlight the wax will reflect. This is important for keeping the plant cool. In a colder, rainier place a plant will grow best with a thinner type of wax. This wax will reflect less light, so the plant will be able to stay warmer.

The second part of your question is a bit more tricky and probably is different for different species (types) of plant. I don’t know what happens in terms of wax and plant growth in other species, but can tell you what happens in the wheat plants that I study: The waxes are on the leaves right from the very beginning when the plant starts to grow, but the wax type changes as the plant gets older. By the time the plant has grown into an adult the waxes no longer change. Plants with different wax types take the same amount of time to grow.