If you want to add a unique touch to your garden, carnivorous plants are bound to get attention. There are several interesting exotic species to consider, such as the ever popular Venus Flytrap or the Cobra plant. Both these plants consume insects and can be of benefit to any garden in that way and in addition, they are a great conversational piece. While the benefit is strictly related to the size and type of carnivorous plants that you own, these plants can provide a small level of relief while providing entertainment to adults and children alike.
Basically there are five different types of carnivorous plants for you to consider. Of course the most popular and more widely known are the plants from the Venus Flytrap plant family. The carnivorous Venus flytrap plant can snap its clamshell leaves around an insect in less than a second.
Once an insect is captured, the plant closes its trap tightly around the meal and bathes it in digestive juices that dissolve the insect’s soft, inner parts. Digestion takes five to 12 days, after which the trap reopens, then the insect’s exoskeleton blows away in the wind or is washed away by rain.
These plants range from colorful to bland, and do not have moving parts like their snap trap counterparts.
Flypaper traps are among some of the coolest carnivorous plants. They are covered with dense, gland-tipped hairs and several tiny midge flies are stuck to the sticky hairs, which causes the insect to be enzymatically digested and absorbed by the plant. The type of secretion created by this particular plant can cause skin irritation to humans and therefore should be treated with caution.
The only carnivorous plant with a true “trapdoor” is the remarkable bladderwort. Numerous, tiny glands inside the bladder absorb most of the internal water and expel it on the outside, and as a result, a partial vacuum is produced inside the bladder and the pressure on the outside becomes greater than the inside. Once an insect or aquatic species has been trapped within, escape is difficult. Bladderworts are more commonly found underwater than above ground, which is another distinct characteristic from other carnivorous plants.
Another favorite carnivorous plant are the lobster-pot traps, and they come with a chamber that is easy to enter, and whose exit is either difficult to find or obstructed by inward-pointing bristles.
In the case of the corkscrew plant, the insides of the plant have downward pointing obstructions and a y-shaped leaf structure that prevents the escape of its prey.
If you do not wish to have a true carnivorous plant in your garden, but would like something with similar characteristics, there are several related species you may want to consider. These plants include the Brocchinia Roridula and members of the Martyniaceae species. These plants lack one of the three required aspects, which is to attract, kill and digest prey, to be classified as a true carnivorous plant.
Carnivorous plants should be placed where young children and babies cannot reach them. While most of them are relatively harmless to humans, digestion of these plants should be avoided, due to the digestive enzymes that the plant utilizes to break down prey.
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