<P> Reproduction means producing offspring for the survival of the species . Plant reproduction is the production of new individuals or offspring in plants, which can be accomplished by sexual or asexual reproduction . Sexual reproduction produces offspring by the fusion of gametes, resulting in offspring genetically different from the parent or parents . Asexual reproduction produces new individuals without the fusion of gametes, genetically identical to the parent plants and each other, except when mutations occur . In seed plants, the offspring can be packaged in a protective seed, which is used as an agent of dispersal . </P> <P> Reproduction in which male and female gametes do not fuse, as they do in sexual reproduction . Asexual reproduction may occur through budding, fragmentation, fission, spore formation and vegetative propagation . Plants have two main types of asexual reproduction in which new plants are produced that are genetically identical clones of the parent individual . Vegetative reproduction involves a vegetative piece of the original plant (budding, tillering, etc .) and is distinguished from apomixis, which is a replacement for sexual reproduction, and in some cases involves seeds . Apomixis occurs in many plant species and also in some non-plant organisms . For apomixis and similar processes in non-plant organisms, see parthenogenesis . </P> <P> Natural vegetative reproduction is mostly a process found in herbaceous and woody perennial plants, and typically involves structural modifications of the stem or roots and in a few species leaves . Most plant species that employ vegetative reproduction do so as a means to perennialize the plants, allowing them to survive from one season to the next and often facilitating their expansion in size . A plant that persists in a location through vegetative reproduction of individuals constitutes a clonal colony; a single ramet, or apparent individual, of a clonal colony is genetically identical to all others in the same colony . The distance that a plant can move during vegetative reproduction is limited, though some plants can produce ramets from branching rhizomes or stolons that cover a wide area, often in only a few growing seasons . In a sense, this process is not one of reproduction but one of survival and expansion of biomass of the individual . When an individual organism increases in size via cell multiplication and remains intact, the process is called vegetative growth . However, in vegetative reproduction, the new plants that result are new individuals in almost every respect except genetic . A major disadvantage to vegetative reproduction, is the transmission of pathogens from parent to offspring; it is uncommon for pathogens to be transmitted from the plant to its seeds (in sexual reproduction or in apomixis), though there are occasions when it occurs . </P>

What are the different methods of asexual reproduction in plants
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