In these cases the anther is to a greater or less degree fixed.
Botanists were for a long time content to know that the scattering of the pollen from the anther, and its application to the stigma, were necessary for the production of perfect seed, but the stages of the process of fertilization remained unexplored.
When the pollen-grains are ripe, the anther dehisces and the pollen is shed.
They are attracted to the flower by its colour or its perfume; they seek, collect or feed on its honey, and while so doing they remove the pollen from the anther and convey it to another flower, there to germinate on the stigma when its tubes travel down the style to the ovary where their contents ultimately fuse with the "oosphere" or immature egg, which becomes in consequence fertilized, and forms a seed which afterwards develops into a new plant (see article Angiosperms).
The movements of the pollen-masses may readily be seen with the naked eye by thrusting the point of a needle into the base of the anther, when the disks adhere to the needle as they would do to the antenna of an insect, and may be withdrawn.