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WHAT IS THIS SOUTH AFRICAN CARNIVORE?

Have a friend, Bihrmann, who is currently working in South Africa. He has been sending me images of mosses, selaginellas, lycopodiums, and carnivorous and other plants, insects, whatever.
He just sent me the image at the other end of the link below.
Is this a primitive type of Venus Fly Trap????
Any identification is appreciated!!
The link is to a site I set up to showcase these images.

http://micheal722.checkoutmypage.com/index.php?p=1_6_Drosera
 
probably not a CP, unless it attracts digests, and some other qualification.
 
Doesn't really look like a CP to me. Those leaves don't look glandular at all - I don't see any organs to secrete digestive enzymes or take up nutritive fluid. Looks more like a succulent if you ask me, and those hairs are there to make the leaves less fun to chew on. If it were a CP, you'd think that there would be one or two crumpled exoskeletons lying on or around it. Probably just a coincidental resemblance.
~Joe
 
I think it looks like a Faucaria, but that doesn't mean it's in that genus. Maybe it is.
 
MIGAWD!!!!!!!!! The dreaded finger chewing trap!! I thought they were a myth!!!! And here it is! A myth no mo'!!!! Thanks terrestrial man! Now I can go to my maker, having seen it all!!!!
 
How about Wannabeis pretendis???
I got this note from Bihrmann on the plants:
The leaves seem unable to move, and there are no substance on the leaves to
digest. It is around 5 cm in diameter, 2 cm high. I did see around 15-20.

Greetings: Bihrmann

Would be interesting to see if there is any relationship to carnivorous as with those shrub like plants in So. Africa that even birds get stuck on and insects do the digesting. Are those then saprophytes???

Hey wasn't there that lunar eclipse!! OMG Suddenly Seymour!!!
 
Way back millions of years ago it could have been carnivorous. But I would think those projections are to hinder animal consumption...although there are drosera nearby! So who knows!
 
I looked at the calender and I decided that it would be best if I just not comment on this topic at this time.
 
  • #10
I looked at the calender and I decided that it would be best if I just not comment on this topic at this time.

What is it your day off?

That just looks like some of my dried out VFT's a while back.
 
  • #12
???


anyways. i think 0zzy is talking about April fools :) this would have been a great one 0z man!
Alex
 
  • #13
Interesting plant. Funny no one mentioned the beautiful sundews in the first photo. :)
 
  • #14
Interesting plant. Funny no one mentioned the beautiful sundews in the first photo. :)

THANK YOU!:banana2:
I will be posting up some very good images of a Drosera next week-end or as soon as I can get my current journal on Selaginella done enough this week for launching.

And if I can find out what that plant is then it will be identified and I will probably move it to another page such as other plants. While it is a look-a-like of sorts of a Venus Flytrap I am fascinated by its appearance and hope to find an explanation for the inturned "bristles" (if this is what they are).
If they were out-turned then the explanation as a protection against
predation would make sense. Obviously these structures enable this plant to survive. But the only possibility I can see is, if this area undergoes any drought and the drosera species you see growing next to it are annual or die back to the ground to survive, as a way of collecting and holding water droplets or even condensation but ???? The only other explanation would be a passive carnivorous activity if these bristles could actually hold an insect or a worm or ?? for other insects or predators to assimilate and any by-products could be used by this plant???
I think it would be interesting to find out!

I like the suggestion that it may be some kind of Faucaria. but I do not think that this genus has any members that grow in boggy situations even during only part of the year.

And this was not meant to be funny but I definitely can get into the humor!
What I really find interesting is that it only points out the possibility that there may yet be new unknows carnivorous plants out there!!! Seymour notwithstanding!!

Will note on this thread when I am able to get some images up of a real carnivorous plant.
 
  • #15
Some location information would be helpful in identifying this plant. South Africa covers a lot of territory. At least list the biome.

And what species is that Drosera? spatulata? I would think if Birhmann was hunting for Drosera he would at least have attempted to ID them. Why no close-ups of the Drosera in his Drosera log? Aren't those real CPs?
 
  • #16
Some location information would be helpful in identifying this plant. South Africa covers a lot of territory. At least list the biome.

And what species is that Drosera? spatulata? I would think if Birhmann was hunting for Drosera he would at least have attempted to ID them. Why no close-ups of the Drosera in his Drosera log? Aren't those real CPs?

Good point.
I believe I mention the area on the home page. It is Bergplaas.

He was not hunting for Drosera. He was exploring to see what he could
find of interest. Initially it was for mosses and liverworts but then he ran across these other plants.

I do not think he is familiar with carnivores on the species level. Nor am I.
And as I have already mentioned I shall endeavor to post up images of the Drosera next week-end. I have other work to do first and then sort through the 60? or so images he has sent since the first ones that I have even really dealt with except for a general web journal of some mosses, lycopodiums?, liverworts, and selaginellas? All of these plants are relatively new to him as well as to me. Finding the people who know these plants is hard enough. Finding those that are willing to help id them is even harder if not impossible. I shall do what I can.
 
  • #17
Identifying the Drosera should not be too difficult a task.
 
  • #19
He's the guy from Little Shop of Horrors.

The musical is way better than that crappy original.
 
  • #20
Where's Mozie? He's from South Africa, maybe he knows what it is or someone who can ID the critter.
 
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