Latest Pitcher plant Stories
[ Watch The Video: Movie of Camponotus Schmitzi ] Public Library of Science An insect-eating pitcher plant teams up with ants to prevent mosquito larvae from stealing its nutrients, according to research published May 22 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Mathias Scharmann and colleagues from the University of Cambridge and the University Brunei Darussalam. The unusual relationship between insect-eating pitcher plants and ants that live exclusively on them has long puzzled...
National Science Foundation In one drop of water are found all the secrets of all the oceans. --- Kahlil Gibran What do a pond or a lake and a carnivorous pitcher plant have in common? The water-filled pool within a pitcher plant, it turns out, is a tiny ecosystem whose inner workings are similar to those of a full-scale water body. Whether small carnivorous plant or huge lake, both are subject to the same ecological "tipping points," of concern on Earth Day--and every day, say...
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online At first glance, pitcher plants appear to be simple carnivorous plants that entrap and digest hapless insects that fall into them. However, a closer look reveals a complex food web of fly larvae, rotifers, midge larvae, and bacteria that exist within the plants’ pitcher. According to a new study by Harvard University, the predator-prey interactions among pitcher plant inhabitants provide an ideal model for understanding food webs on...
Watch the video "Ants Aquaplaning On A Pitcher Plant" Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Researchers from the University of Cambridge have observed for the first time how a Venezuelan pitcher plant uses moisture on its tiny hairs to create a ‘waterslide of death’ that sends unsuspecting ants further down into the plant, where they are eventually digested. According to a new report in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the plant’s tiny hairs, known as...
[ Watch the Video ] We’re all quite familiar with carnivorous plants. Plants such as the venus flytrap feed on flies and other insects, providing an appetizing place for bugs to feed before snatching them up in their jaws and feeding on the remains. Now, scientists from Cambridge University have found that a similarly carnivorous plant employs the laws of physics to help it find its meals. Hailing from south-east Asia, “Pitcher Plants” (or Nepenthes gracilis to those in the know)...
Scientists at the University of Oregon have determined the fine-scale genetic structure of the first animal to show an evolutionary response to rapid climate change.They used a high-throughput sequencing technique called Restriction-site Associated DNA (RAD) tagging to make the discovery.Their results, which focus on the pitcher plant mosquito, Wyeomyia smithii, are published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).RAD tagging is an effective and...
Scientists in the United Kingdom are reporting evidence that consumption of insects contaminated with a toxic metal may be a factor in the mysterious global decline of meat-eating, or carnivorous, plants. Their study describes how meals of contaminated insects have adverse effects on the plants. It appears in ACS' semi-monthly journal Environmental Science & Technology.Iain Green and Christopher Moody note that many species of carnivorous plants "” which have the amazing ability to...
Findings advance understanding of how complete food webs functionLike the man-eating plant in Little Shop of Horrors, carnivorous plants rely on animal prey for sustenance. Fortunately for humans, carnivorous plants found in nature are not dependent on a diet of human blood but rather are satisfied with the occasional fly or other insect. The existence of carnivorous plants has fascinated botanists and non-botanists alike for centuries and raises the question, "Why are some plants...
