Ironic, isn't it! Actually it's also the case with people who have
snakes, they have to be very careful about the live prey they give their
pets and that the snake eats it promptly, because if the snake is not
hungry and the mouse or rat stays in there a few hours untouched it may
decide to turn the tails and take a few bites out of the snake, injuring
it badly, sometimes killing it.
The reason CP are susceptible to insect infection is the critters are
smart! :-) They settle on the stem and underside i.e. non-tentacled
non-sticky side of the leaves of sundews, almost every inch of the Venus
flytrap but especially newly forming traps, the underside of butterwort
leaves (although there are species with both sides of their leaves that
are greasy), the rhizome and outside surface of Sarracenia pitchers, the
flower stalks of bladderworts etc. They also feed on the roots of CP.
Sometimes, if the infection is severe and the plant is weak, they'll
calmy walk across the dewless tentacles of sundews and feed on the top
surface of the trap leaves as well.
Slugs and snails are impervious to the sticky traps of most plants because of
their mucous covered bodies, they'll chew on a sundew or butterwort as if it
were a head of lettuce.
I once had a D. intermedia indoors and I fed it a couple of fruitflies.
The next morning the flies were gone without a trace. Puzzled I fed it
again, watching the leaves close around the flies completely. The next
day the flies were again missing! Determined to solve the mystery of
the disappearing Drosophila, I fed 4 traps again with flies, and watched
the leaves close. When night came I placed a lamp above the pot covered
with a red filter to imitate the nocturnal lighting you see in some
zoos. I checked the pot thoroughly every ten minutes or so. Two long
hours into the night something caught my eye, a small slug was emerging
from the point where the soil meets the side of the pot. I pulled up a
chair and began my safari! He (or to be hermaphroditically politically
correct he/she) slowly emerged and made a straight line to the base of
the sundew. He crawled up the stem, crawled out onto a leaf, stuck his
head into the folded trap and ate the fly! He did this three more
times. Since he never climbed up a leaf that didn't have prey he must
have smelled the presence of the flies. When he was done he crawled
down the stem and started for his hiding place. Since the pot was a
very wet mixture of peat with no covering of moss, his trail was
invisible. I found his adventure quite amusing, I picked him up with a
pair of tweezers before he made his escape and released him into the
wilds of my backyard. Now, if instead of eating flies he had chewed on
my plant the outcome might not have been so pleasant! :-)
Take care,
Demetrios