Nepenthes- The Deadly Pitcher

(Submitted for World Wildlife Day contest organised by Indian Botanists Blog-o-Journal)
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-Gauri Nerkar, Coimbatore, India.

Nepenthes goettingensis
 Photographed at Botanischer Garten, Berlin (Germany)

Carnivory in plants is a relatively rare phenomenon. There are about 600 species, the majority of which belong to the Orders Caryophyllales and Lamiales (Ellison et al., 2009). Nepenthaceae (Caryophyllales) contains >100 species, making it the largest Family of pitcher plants. Nepenthes are the largest genus of pitcher plants, with its center of diversity in South-east Asia. The plants grow in substrates that are deficient in nitrogen and offset this deficiency by trapping animal prey, primarily arthropods. Nepenthes use combinations of wettable peristomes, wax layers and viscoelastic fluid to trap and retain prey (Moran and Clarke, 2010).

Blue Fluorescent Emissions from Carnivorous Plant Attracts Prey: Indian Scientists

     Scientists from Jawaharlal Nehru Tropical Botanic Garden and Research Institute, Pacha-Palode, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India have reported a new prey capture mechanism in some species of carnivorous plants. They found the existence of distinct blue fluorescence emissions at the 'capture spots' of Nepenthes, Sarracenia, Drosera, Pinguicula, Dionaea muscipula and Utricularia stellaris at UV 366 nm. When the capture spot was masked by coating a non-fluorescent extract, the pray capture was drastically reduced. The study has been published as a short research paper in  the current issue of  'Plant Biology'