All About Carnivorous Plants

Carnivorous plants are predatory flowering plants that kill animals to obtain nutrition from their bodies. Carnivorous plants are plants specialized for trapping and digestion of animals. The Carnivorous plant, sometimes called the insectivorous plant, is any plant specifically adapted to capture and digest insects and other animals through pests and traps. They share three characteristics that work together and distinguish them from other plants.

●Capture and kill prey
●There is a mechanism to facilitate digestion of prey
●Get a significant benefit from the nutrients assimilated from the hunt

To say it in more human terms, ‘what are carnivorous plants’? carnivorous plants are those plants who eat things like insects, spiders, crustaceans and other small soil and invertebrates living in water and protozoans, lizards, rats, mice, and other small vertebrates. Carnivorous plants differ in size, shape, and mechanism to attract prey. These plants are very popular and often cultivated due to their interesting morphology and unusual eating habits.

Carnivorous plants are everywhere and have been catching insects for a very long time – possibly many millions of years. Carnivorous plants have long fascinated people both young and old. There is a wide diversity of meat-eating plants in nature, varying greatly in appearance and in the way they consume animals. Carnivorous plants tend to grow in places where the soil is refined or inadequate in nutrients like bogs and rocky areas, so these plants must get some of their nutrients by trapping and digesting animals, especially insects. More than 600 species and subspecies of carnivorous plants have been identified, some of the famous plants are mentioned below in the carnivorous plants list

Venus Fly Trap

With leaves that snap shut as soon as prey touches their ‘trigger’ hairs, the Venus Flytrap is one of the only plants on Earth that walks right in front of your eyes! I Venus fly traps use a “snap trap” to catch their prey.

Pitcher Plant

All that’s left of unfortunate frogs caught by this plant are little frog slippers—the skin on the frogs’ feet is the only part the plant doesn’t digest. Pitcher plants use a “pit trap” to collect their food.

Sundews

The thirst quencher looks like raindrops on the leaves. But “water” is actually a gum-like substance to trap insects. Sundews get their name from glossy, sticky, hairlike trichomes, which stash enzymes that digest insects.

Butterworts

These plants live in water and trap small aquatic animals in their cup-shaped leaves.

Bladderworts

The only carnivorous plant with a true “trapdoor” is the remarkable bladderwort. This small submarine aquatic plant has nature’s most definite and fragile trap, and certainly the fastest. Thousands of minute bladders are attached to feathery submersed branchlets by tiny stalks.

And much more… .More carnivorous plants benefit from bright indirect light or even some direct sunlight. They generally prefer acidic soils high in peat and/or sphagnum moss. Most need to be watered with distilled water with little or no fertilizer.

Facts About Carnivorous Plant

●Most of the 600 carnivorous plant species can be divided into five categories: sundews, butterworts, pitcher plants, bladderworts and Venus flytraps.
●Some carnivorous plants also do not use digestive enzymes.
●Some carnivorous plants use “active sticky traps” to trap insects.
●Others use “passive sticky traps
●Carnivorous plants produce digestive enzymes or use bacterial enzymes for digestion of food.
●Some plants combine these two methods. Some species of carnivorous plants use insect armor to absorb all the nutrients they need.
●Carnivorous plants can live on land or in water.
●Lifespan depends on the species, but some carnivorous plants (such as sundrew) can live up to 50 years in the wild.

So, that was all about carnivorous plants in India and outer India. Carnivorous plants can be purchased at most nurseries and even online. So, if you wish to buy or send plants online india or outside India, visit any online portal and explore a wide variety. Happy Gifting!