Gleaming, gluey, deathtrap hairs have betrayed the secret identity of a well-known wildflower: It’s a carnivore.
A species of false asphodel (Triantha occidentalis) uses enzyme-secreting hairs on its flowering stem to snare and digest insects, researchers report in the Aug. 17 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Scientists have known about T. occidentalis since the 19th century, but its taste for meat has gone undetected until now.
Sticky hairs by themselves aren’t unusual — many noncarnivorous plants use them to defend against pests. But T. occidentalis has qualities that some meat-eating plants share: a love of bright, boggy, nutrient-poor habitats and the absence of a gene that fine-tunes
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