Wednesday 19 June 2013
Cool Organism of the Month, June 2013: Puya chilensis
I've previously been doing Cool Animal of the Month, but this Summer it's a plant that takes the prize for the most amazing organism I've seen. It's a fucking huge bromeliad - like a pineapple on steroids - and it traps and eats animals up to the size of a sheep! A SHEEP-EATING PINEAPPLE! The world is a strange and wonderful place. I guess now I'm doing Cool Organism of the Month instead.
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Woah! Seems like such an aggressive technique for the plant to utilise just to get nutrients. I wonder if it's got anything to do with the sort of areas it grows in (low content of organic matter in soil, etc).
ReplyDeleteCould be, could be. Tomatoes aren't much different. If the nitrogen levels in the soil start getting too low the plant secretes a substance that attracts and kills flies, which fall to the ground and replenish the soil.
DeleteTomatoes http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/6727709/Tomatoes-can-eat-insects.html
Venus Flytrap http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Venus_Flytrap
Pitcher Plants http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Nepenthes
Toilet Plant http://www.livescience.com/9666-pitcher-plant-doubles-toilet.html Heheheh, "the training of the shrew"
Cape Sundew http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drosera_capensis I've seen this at Kew, always covered in flies!