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That'd be a mimosa tree...also known as "that damn weed that sprouts up everywhere." Go ahead and buy several kids. Let 'em seed, and play with the seeds in the yard.

Your parents will love you for it.

That stuff grows wild here in Central America, when you touch it with your finger the leaves fold up.

Beware, this plant is a weed. It doesn't take much for it to propagate once it comes in contact with soil. It's fun for a bit, but it gets real old once you find this plant all over your yard, and you walk barefoot around your yard. This stuff's prickly.

Just go to a local park during the summer, look for fuzzy purple puff balls on the ground, and have at it. Paying $4.95 for a type of weed is just the type of shenanigans that you should look out for.

Don't confuse these with a mimosa tree. They will only get a few feet tall and rarely survive outside of tropical climates.

I love the TickleMe plant. I bought the growing kit at www.scientificsonline. It was the best experience I had with my kids in a long time.When we saw the leaves fold up it was like magic!
This reminds me that I need to buy more TickleMe Plant kits for the holidays!
I love edmunds scientifics and I love my Tickleme plant!

This is the best plant my kids have ever grown. It works best as a potted plant. We take ours outside during warmer weather. Any kid or those young at heart that have never experienced growing the TickleMe Plant, is missing out. You can get the TickleMe Plant at www.teachersource.com and some places even carry a GREENHOUSE to help them stay warm. My family gives them as gifts. Our children have never forgotten this wonderful plant. It changes the way you look at plants forever.

This is the best plant my kids have ever grown. It works best as a potted plant. We take ours outside during warmer weather. Any kid or those young at heart that have never experienced growing the TickleMe Plant, is missing out. You can get the TickleMe Plant at www.teachersource.com and some places even carry a GREENHOUSE to help them stay warm. My family gives them as gifts. Our children have never forgotten this wonderful plant. It changes the way you look at plants forever.

This is the best plant my kids have ever grown. It works best as a potted plant. We take ours outside during warmer weather. Any kid or those young at heart that have never experienced growing the TickleMe Plant, is missing out. You can get the TickleMe Plant at www.teachersource.com and some places even carry a GREENHOUSE to help them stay warm. My family gives them as gifts. Our children have never forgotten this wonderful plant. It changes the way you look at plants forever.

I have purchased directly from the TickleMe Plant Company and have found their products to be of high quality and educational. I have spoken to one of the owners Mark, who has been teaching science and using these exciting plants with his science students for the last thirty years. He helped me to set up my classroom experiments and has me "Plant Doctor" advice when our class once needed it. I can't say enough about how sensitive they are to these sensitive plants!

I have purchased directly from the TickleMe Plant Company and have found their products to be of high quality and educational. I have spoken to one of the owners Mark, who has been teaching science and using these exciting plants with his science students for the last thirty years. He helped me to set up my classroom experiments and has me "Plant Doctor" advice when our class once needed it. I can't say enough about how sensitive they are to these sensitive plants!

Wow! Thanks I have been looking for this Tickleme plant since I was a young child. Everyone just gave me a blank expression here in the usa when I tell me I had plants that moved in my back yard. This bought back memories that till now which were forgotten. We used to called it a shyplant but even then I didn't know how to grow it in a flower pot. Nice pictures.
This is awesome!

No one has mentioned the amazing cotton candy like puff ball flowers that appear in the full grown TickleMe Plants. I saw the TickleMe Plant Flower video on You Tube (check it out), grew my own and now I have these cool flowers too and my own home grown seeds. I got mine at the Exploratorium in California!

I'm pretty sure this is the exact same plant that Hawaiian missionaries planted on the islands to make the islanders wear shoes. The shoots have these very painful prickly spines on them. If you're going to plant this outside, watch your step! Also, you shouldn't plant this outside. It spreads very quickly. Like, kudzu-speeds.

We grew these plants indoors over the winter, I didn't expect them to grow, but in a few weeks they started to grow and then later blossomed flowers. My children were amazed on how they were able to move.

I saw the TickleMe Plant Greenhouse for the first time at the Children's Museum in Chicago. I'm not sure if it will be the next Chia Pet but they seem to like each other.
The TickleMe Plant and the Chia Pet are must have items for kids. So you can bet Santa will be bringing home lots of TickleMe Plant Greenhouses this year!

Call me paranoid, but I'd say about 85% of the above comments are from the same person, and probably affilated with ticklemeplant.com. Not cool.

Indeed...

Does it grow in -30 Canadian winters?

Actually they will grow in -30 Canadian winters. I live in upstate New York near the Canadian border and with the help of our woodstove and a bright window I have planted my TickleMe Plant seeds in the heart of the winter and by spring I had my own seed pods!
They enjoy a misting of water too. I even have a friend in Alaska that grew them under lights. You can grow it Canada!

Advertising this is a bad idea. The common Sensitive Mimosa is an invasive weed in tropical areas which will include southern USA. See http://www.nrw.qld.gov.au/factsheets/pdf/pest/pp38.pdf
and many other australian references.

The link above is for Austraila. The TickleMe Plant (Mimosa pudica) is NOT listed by the USDA http://plants.usda.gov/java/noxious?rptType=Federal as an invasive species in the Continental USA, where it is sold. There is a speices of sensitive Mimosa (Mimosa invisa) which can be invasive but this is NOT a TickleMe Plant.
From the website www.ticklemeplant.com it cleary recommends TickleMe Plants as a houseplant.

we had these "sleeping grass" plants in hawaii, many of them had painful thorns for you to step on. I think we called pokey grass weeds "kuka" plants. ahh, memories.

Cool, and you can extract the DMT from the roots for a whole different set of fun experiments! (though it's a weaker concentration than some other species)

Looks like a fun plant. I want one!

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