Producer or Carnivore ?

5.10A

Venus Flytrap

The leaves of the Venus flytrap have two wing-like lobes. A lobe is a rounded part that sticks out.

Lobes

The lobes are joined with a hinge that allows the lobes to snap shut and then reopen.

Closed Lobes

Three or four short hairs grow on the inside of each lobe. Touch one of these hairs and nothing happens. Touch two of these hairs, and a meal may be in the making! What is going on?

Hairs

A Venus flytrap is a carnivorous plant! (When something is carnivorous, it eats meat.)

Green plants make their own food in a process called photosynthesis.

During this process, plants use energy from the sun to change carbon dioxide and water into food, called glucose.

Plants also require nutrients. Most plants get their nutrients from soil and water.

Venus flytraps live in bogs in the southeast United States. A bog is a place

with wet, spongy ground. It is a poorly drained

wetland. The soil in bogs is lacking the nutrients

most plants need.

By being carnivorous, Venus flytraps are able to

survive in bogs. They obtain the nitrogen and

other nutrients they need by eating meat.

The Venus flytrap uses its hinged leaves as its trap. Insects are attracted to the trap by its color and the sweet smell of nectar.

When an insect crawls onto the trap, the two lobes snap shut, trapping the insect inside.

The plant then releases digestive juices that dissolve the insect into a nutrient-rich liquid.

The short hairs growing on the inside of the wing-like leaf lobes are trigger hairs.

Touching one hair does not trigger the trap—but touching two hairs does. This is because a plant spends energy snapping shut its trap.

It takes energy and time to reopen it. A plant does not want to waste energy. Live prey is more likely to set off two trigger hairs than a piece of grass or leaf.