Abstract
I AM not aware that the Drosera has been noticed to capture so large an insect as the dragon-fly, Pyrrhosoma minium. Passing a pond-side on a bright June morning, where this insect wasflying plentifully, and near which Drosera rotundifolia was growing in abundance, I saw that many of these insects had fallen victims to the carnivorous propensities of the plant. On one spot about a foot square I counted six plants which had captured specimens of the dragon-fly, besides smaller insects. One plant had possessed itself of two of the dragon-flies, one being partially digested and the other freshly caught. The Drosera plants, being young, were in many instances less in expanse than the dragon-flies caught upon them, which measure about two inches across the wings, with a body about one inch and a half long. The dragon-flies appeared to be attracted to the plants by the reflected sunlight glistening upon the beads offluid secreted from the leaves, and from which the plant receives its common name of “sun-dew.” Those dragon-flies which I saw caught hovered over the plants about a second, at a distance of three or four feet, and then darted upon the plant, when they were instantly caught.
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BALDING, A. Voracity of the Drosera. Nature 30, 241 (1884). https://doi.org/10.1038/030241a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/030241a0
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