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The Big Thicket region has four of the five carnivorous plants found in the United States. These pitcher plants are the most famous.
No, this was not photographed in northern GA! These magnificent pitcherplants were located in Splinter Hill Bog Preserve in southern Alabama. This site is renowned for this species, but it also hosts breeding Bachman's Sparrows, which is what I was after. The pitcherplants, a singing Bachman's Sparrow, and a flyover Swallow-tailed Kite all make that day very memorable (late June two summers ago)!
Carnivorous plants are plants that derive some or most of their nutrients (but not energy) from trapping and consuming animals or protozoans, typically insects and other arthropods.
Yellow Pitcher Plant (Sarracenia flava) was the largest of the three species of pitcher plants that I photographed at the Green Swamp near Wilmington, North Carolina. In this species, the end of the leaf forms a distinctive canopy over the insect-trapping pitcher.
An oil painting of the preceding photo that I'm pleased with. It kept the misty appearance but brightened the colors.
Walt Disney World - Epcot - 05/12/09
Pitcher plant (the bottom half), part of a display at the Epcot Flower and Garden Festival.
the tall stems permit the carnivorous pitcher plants (Sarracenia purpurea) to get pollinated by the insects that may later fall victim to the pitchers below... Purbeck, Dorset
Small portion of this extensive site in CNF. Sadly a mere remnant of natural area in a national forest heavily impacted by historical industry-centered forestry practices. This site represents successful efforts to recover the historical longleaf pine barrens that were predominant in the region prior to 1900.
This is yet another of the carnivorous plant sculptures on display at Bok Tower Gardens.
There were several of the actual plants located nearby, and I'll post the best photo I was able to get of the real plant (mostly obscured by grasses and other foliage). The image of the live plant will have a brief description also.
Happy Gorgeous Green Thursday!
Pentax 645, SMC Pentax-A 120/4, Kodak Ektar 120 format film, ISO 100, f5.6 - 1/60, Epson V500 scanner.
Some are just enormous!
The display in the conservatories in the Domain in Auckland just took my breath away. I've never seen such pitcher plants and we saw some amazing ones in Sabah!
Some Great facts:
The pitcherplant is a perennial forb that spreads by short rhizomes. Plants form an open, spreading rosette of green leaves. The leaves are often tinged or veined with purple, and can grow to 30 cm in length. The plants flower in mid-spring, producing a solitary flower at the top of a scape 20 – 40 cm tall. The flower resembles a thick, flat disc ringed with dark, maroon petals. The plants are most noted, however, for the hollow, gibbous leaves, or pitchers, that give the plant its name.
The pitchers trap and digesting flying and crawling insects, making the species one of the few carnivorous plants in North America. The hollow pitchers fill naturally with rainwater. The pitchers also have broad lips where insects land. The insects crawl into the pitcher, where stiff, downward pointing hairs prevent them from leaving. Anectdoctal evidence suggests pitchers capture less than one percent of the flies that venture into their traps, but a few insects eventually fall into the water at the base of the pitcher, where digestive enzymes secreted by the plant release the nutrients within the insects. Eventually, the nutrients are absorbed by the plant, which supplements the nutrients absorbed by the roots.
At least two insects also use the pitchers as a breeding location. A community of microorganisms eventually develops in the water at the base of the pitchers. These microorganisms live on the nutrients of the decaying insects, and may actually increase the nutrients available to the plant by further digesting its prey. The microorganisms are themselves prey to at least two species of carnivorous insects – the larvae of a mosquito and the larvae of a midge – which complete their life cycles in the pitchers. For some reason, the digestive enzymes secreted by the plant affect neither species.
Pitcherplants are widespread in eastern North America, ranging from the Gulf Coast of the Florida panhandle to Nova Scotia, and across Canada to the base of the Rocky Mountains. Primarily a northern species, isolated populations occur along the Atlantic Coast and in the Appalachian Mountains. Pitcher plants grow primarily in sphagnum bogs, although they can be found in any wetland with long periods of standing water, including roadside ditches.
The Pitcher-plant is a carnivorous plant, a meat eater. Carnivorous plants usually live in nitrogen poor soils. They have 'learned' to augment the inadequate nitrogen available in the soil by capturing and consuming insects!
The inside of the tubular shaped leaf is lined with downward pointing hairs. These hairs block an insect from climbing up the tube and escaping. The fluid in the bottom of the tube contains digestive juices that will consume the insect prey.
Despite their non-native and potentially invasive status, the beauty of the modified leaves is undeniable.
The bog garden at Brookside Gardens is tiny, perhaps 4 square yards, but fascinating. In mid-October the pitcherplants there are spectacular. Brookside Gardens is in Wheaton, MD, USA.
Posted to Parks, Arboretums, Botanical Gardens
I posted this to Floral Friday before realizing that these are NOT flowers. Pitcherpant tubes are specialized leaves.
Spent a week in the panhandle for a change. Much of it wandering around the Apalachicola National Forest. This amazing pitcherplant bog was loaded with Yellow Pitcherplants in both the red and yellow color forms. There were at least seven different species of carnivorous plants found here, including Venus Flytraps which are naturalized in this area. Also many, many Snowy Orchids (Platanthera nivea) mixed in. You can see one of them if you look closely.
A highlight seen but not photographed while wandering the forest was a beautiful black bear crossing one of the dirt roads.
Whitetop Pitcherplant (Sarracenia leucophylla) growing in Yellow River Marsh Preserve State Park, Florida.
From the state park's web page:
The Yellow River Marsh Preserve protects one of Florida's last remaining tracts of wet prairie, including the largest community of pitcher plants in the state. The carnivorous plants flourish here, passively trapping insects in specialized tube-shaped leaves and absorbing nutrients from their decomposing prey. The preserve is located in Santa Rosa County on Garcon Point, which separates Escambia Bay from Blackwater Bay. Nearly 20 rare and endangered species of plants and animals make their homes along the bay and its wet prairies, dome swamps, and flatwoods. There are no recreational facilities in the preserve, but the sweeping landscapes of the pitcher plant prairies offer a tremendous opportunity for photography and nature appreciation. A small parking area and public access point are located at the intersection of Dickerson City Road and Garcon Point Road (CR-191).
the tall stems permit the carnivorous pitcher plants (Sarracenia purpurea) to get pollinated by the insects that may later fall victim to the pitchers below... Purbeck, Dorset
A carnivorous plant from the Southeastern United States. Seen in one of the greenhouses at The Huntington Library.
These Pitcherplants (Sarracenia purpurea) are grown from seed and are now well established in my native bog garden, together with sphagnum moss and other bog plants
"Autumn Pitcher Plants in a Bog' by Patti Deters. Along the boardwalk through the beautifully unique ecosystem of Orono Bog, in Maine, USA, clusters of crimson Northern Pitcher Plants (Sarracenia purpurea) forms a colony in the mossy peat ground, surrounded by sphagnum moss. These fascinating carnivorous plants have evolved to survive in nutrient-poor wetlands by luring, capturing, and "eating" a variety of insects. Each tubular “pitcher” fills with rainwater, where unsuspecting bugs slip inside and are slowly digested. Once prized by early botanists for their unique insect-trapping abilities, pitcher plants are now a symbol of the delicate balance found in bog ecosystems. Scientists have discovered that these plants can even host tiny “communities” of mosquito larvae and bacteria living inside their pitchers! Their deep red hues and sculpted forms make them look like something from an alien world or fantasy tale. Thank you for viewing this picture. If you like outdoor nature photography, you can purchase or just enjoy looking at more plant-focused images at patti-deters.pixels.com/featured/autumn-pitcher-plants-in....
A prey-trapping mechanism featuring a deep cavity filled with digestive liquid. The traps of what are considered to be "true" pitcher plants are formed by specialized leaves. The plants attract and drown their prey with nectar.
A large swath of the Atlanta Botanical Garden's Skyline Garden, bounded by a gracefully curving path, is home to a variety of carnivorous plants. These are mostly pitcher plants, members of the of the genus Sarracenia.
Here you have a cluster of crimson pitcher plants (Sarracenia leucophylla) and their brownish-red flowers. I'm accustomed to seeing the pitchers alone, without the flowers present. Being a botanical neophyte, I thought that the pitchers and the flowers were two different plants. (It turns out that the flowers are only around a few weeks in the spring, so they aren't visible much of the time the pitchers are.) Luckily, the Garden's conservatory manager Paul Blackmore was on hand to set me straight about this.
Paul also pointed out a few plants that were a mutant variant of Sarracenia leucophylla. If I understood his description correctly, these have flowers that are composed entirely of petals, reduced in size and multiplied to form something like an elongated teardrop. Without possessing the innards of real flowers, I'm not sure how they propagate. Like I said, I'm a botanical neophyte.
I'm taken by the shape and deep red color of these (non-mutant) flowers. The Wikipedia entry describes them as "nodding." This strikes me as quite fitting. Somehow, when I look at flowers, I often imagine faces and gestures, too.