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Trees. Not from the sea—that’ll be sponges you’re thinking of—loofahs grow on trees. They are a kind of gourd and are regarded as a tasty snack throughout Asia. Smooth loofah (Luffa aegyptiaca) is a rampant, fast-growing annual vine that produces pretty yellow flowers and strangelooking fruits that are edible when immature and useful when fully grown. The vine can grow more than 30 feet long and scrambles over anything in its path. Probably native to tropical Africa and Asia, it is grown throughout most of Asia and is cultivated commercially in the United States for export to Japan. The immature fruits, 3 to 6 inches in length, can be stir-fried whole or sliced, or they can be grated and used in soups and omelettes. Any fruits longer than 4 inches need to be peeled because the skin becomes bitter. Allowed to mature on the vine until they start turning brown and their stems go yellow, loofahs are easy to peel for use as back scrubbers, skin exfoliators, or general kitchen pot scrubs. What’s the strongest wood? Balsa. It’s the strongest wood in the world when measured in three categories of stiffness, bendability, and compressibility—stronger than oak or pine. Although it is the softest of woods, it is not, botanically, a softwood but a hardwood.Hardwood is a botanical term that describes broad-leaved, mostly deciduous trees that are angiosperms (flowering plants such as balsa) as opposed to coniferous gymnosperms (nonflowering plants such as pine). It is also light, of course, though it is not the lightest in the world—the lightest practical wood is a New Zealand native, the small whau tree (pronounced “phow”), which is used by Maori fishermen to make floats. Balsais Spanish for “raft.” Balsa wood is mothproof. What do you get if you suck your pencil? Nothing bad, apart from being told not to.