'Baby Gum Tree?

Question

Why is a ‘baby’ gum tree such a tiny seedling when it comes from such a huge tree, compared to a human baby, which is so large when compared to the size of it’s parents?

Answer 1

They have different methods to give themselves the best chance of producing an offspring. People have one very big baby at a time, it uses a lot of resources and effort but because it's parents look after it carefully it has a pretty good chance of surviving.

Instead of putting a lot of energy into producing one or only a few babies the gum tree produces millions of tiny seeds, they are not very well equipped but the fact that there are so many of them means that out of all those millions one will happen to land in a good spot and be lucky enough to survive.

So in the end both methods prove to be effective for that organism.