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Anyone reading this book cannot fail to realize the importance of self-generated electric fields and currents in the energetics and control of metabolism in plants. We should therefore not be too surprised to find that externally applied fields also have effects. In this chapter, I will describe a few of the more significant findings from over a century of research and try to explain and sometimes reinterpret them in the light of more modern knowledge. The work is divided into three sections. Section 1 is on the non-polar effects of DC fields, where the effects are not related to the direction of the field. It ranges from responses to massive electric fields, such as those found in thunderstorms, to the effects of much weaker ones on the growth and differentiation of tissue cultures. Section 2 is on the polar effects of DC fields, where the direction of the response is related to the direction of the field and includes effects on polar growth and tropisms. Section 3 is on the effects of time-varying and alternating electromagnetic fields, where I will present evidence that a simple change in membrane stability can account for virtually all of the hitherto mysterious biological effects of weak electromagnetic radiation. Non-polar effects of DC electric fields High voltage natural fields and the rise and fall of electroculture PhenomenologyWork on the effects of electrical fields on plants goes back several centuries, but the first person to carry out large scale experiments was Karl Lemström, who was a Professor of Physics at Helsinki. He had paid several visits to the Arctic, and was surprised how green and healthy the vegetation looked, despite the low light and temperature. He wondered whether this might be due to the weak electric currents carried through the atmosphere by air ions from the aurora borealis. His suspicions were confirmed when he looked at

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