. Coast watch. Marine resources; Oceanography; Coastal zone management; Coastal ecology. NATURALIST'S NOTEBOOK sealing it into a digestive vat. After drowning the victim and absorbing its nutrients, the trap reopens, allowing the undigested remains to blow away. A trap wears out after one to four live meals, when the leaf turns black and dies. A trap that captures nothing can close up to 10 times, reopening in 24 hours each time. Contrary to its name, research shows that only 2 percent of the plant's prey are flies, with 90 percent of its captives coming from the ant, beetle and spider kingdom
. Coast watch. Marine resources; Oceanography; Coastal zone management; Coastal ecology. NATURALIST'S NOTEBOOK sealing it into a digestive vat. After drowning the victim and absorbing its nutrients, the trap reopens, allowing the undigested remains to blow away. A trap wears out after one to four live meals, when the leaf turns black and dies. A trap that captures nothing can close up to 10 times, reopening in 24 hours each time. Contrary to its name, research shows that only 2 percent of the plant's prey are flies, with 90 percent of its captives coming from the ant, beetle and spider kingdoms, and the rest dubbed miscellaneous, Gardner says. "Maybe it should be more accurately called the Venus' ant trap," he observes. The diversity of prisoners found in the traps rules out the possibility that the plant has one lure. "No single attractant could bring in spiders, beetles and ants — they don't even belong to the same kingdom," he says. "The one thing that all their captives have in common is that they are all ground-dwelling, hopping, crawling animals and that they just happen to wander into these ; Most victims are those that walk the earth as opposed to fly, agrees Dunn, who says the weirdest sight he's seen in a trap was a young green lizard. "That's pretty unusual, but it looked dramatic," he says. "Half its body was trapped inside, and •? it ; Such amazing feats conjure up images of huge plants, but a mature Venus' flytrap is no more than 4 to 5 inches tall. And despite its ferocious reputation, the plant itself is vulnerable, worthy of a legal designation of "special concern" in North Carolina. Loss of habitat is the main reason it is now rare in the wild, with poaching a lesser Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resem
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookcollectionunclibra, booksubjectoceanography
