Re: Insect-Eating flowers

writserv@mi.net
Wed, 10 Jan 1996 08:30:53 -0400

>There are to my knowledge at least four families of plants in which flowers
>occur that trap and incidentally kill their pollenating insects ( but don't
>digest them and so are not "carnivorous" ); the waterlily family
>Nymphaeaceae, the arum or philodendron family Araceae, the milkweed family
>Asclepiadaceae, and the pipevine family Aristolochiaceae. Less clear are the
>trapping features of the orchid family, Orchidaceae, where many flowers
>exsist that variously dunk, slap, tease, imitate, and do practicaly anything
>but trap their insect. There was rumored to be a trapping orchid: Masdevallia
>muscosa - if anyone knows anything of it I would be most interested.
>
>Evolutionarily, there would be nothing stopping a plant from trapping for
>consumption any and all non-pollenating insects as long as that did not
>affect their target pollenator species.
>Its a fascinating question: why haven't carnivores evolved to more directly
>exploit the pollenating habits of insects? Or do the pitcher plants do this?
>
>David
>
>daviddog@aol.com

I think that you have the question wrong. Insects do not have pollenating
agendas, they look for food. CPs take advantage of this.

Rand Nicholson (writserv@mi.net)
Canada