Carnivorous plant hunter

2002/03/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Botanika

Carnivorous plants, in general, have no choice but to eat small insects that fall into their clutches, cannot separate their food. But, as has appeared in the journal Nature, the ‘jarras’ (albomarginata Nephentes) plant that lives in the pluviometric forest of Brunei has a strategy of attraction of termites. It is called this way because it has a pitcher shape.

It produces long white hairs around the mouth of the jar and when the termites pass through the area they cannot resist the temptation. The termite that is with the plant warns all the others of the group and, while the hairs feed, fall one after another in the mouth of the pitcher plant.

Termites rarely eat, but each time the plant eats a good meal. According to German researchers, in a minute 22 termites can fall into the mouth of the plant. For the moment, Brunei's pitcher plant is the only carnivorous plant with predatory strategy.