Algae are in the plant kingdom, but technically they are not plants. A diverse group of organisms, algae survive in even the harshest habitats.
Chara is often called muskgrass or skunkweed because of its foul, musty almost garlic-like odor. Chara is a gray-green branched multicellular algae that is often confused with submerged flowering plants. However, Chara has no flower, will not extend above the water surface, and often has a “grainy” or “crunchy” texture. Chara has cylindrical, whorled branches with 6 to 16 branchlets around each node. Algae are in the plant kingdom, but technically they are not plants. A diverse group of organisms, algae survive in even the harshest habitats. From the dry desert, to the Arctic Circle, to boiling springs, these organisms have found a way to extract enough from their environment to live. Algae are primitive, primarily aquatic, one-celled or multicellular plant-like organisms that lack true stems, roots, and leaves but usually contain chlorophyll. There are both marine and freshwater algae, and algae are found almost everywhere on earth. Algae are simple plants that can range from the microscopic (microalgae), to large seaweeds (macroalgae), such as giant kelp more than one hundred feet in length. Microalgae include both cyanobacteria, (similar to bacteria, and formerly called “blue-green algae”) as well as green, brown and red algae. Diatoms are a group of algae often considered the most beautiful because of the glass-like silica shell that houses them. These shells come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes and some species can form long chains when linked together. Their appearance is somewhat kaleidoscopic. Chlorophyll is a green pigment that gives most plants their color.The reason that it is green is because it absorbs other colors of light such as red and blue, so in a way the green light is reflected out since the pigment does not absorb it. Land plants (and plants in the ocean, called algae) have a lot of chlorophyll-a pigment because it is essential to photosynthesis, but they also have other pigments, called accessory pigments, that help them absorb light.
http://aquaplant.tamu.edu/plant-identification/alphabetical-index/muskgrass/ http://plants.ifas.ufl.edu/manage/why-manage-plants/aquatic-and-wetland-plants-in-florida/algae/ http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/wq/plants/algae/lakes/AlgaeInformation.html http://allaboutalgae.com/what-are-algae/ http://plants.ifas.ufl.edu/manage/why-manage-plants/aquatic-and-wetland-plants-in-florida/algae/ http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=1110 http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=1110
why are algae confused as plants