Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/02/15/a-hilarious-and-educational-look-at-the-symbiotic-relationship-between-tree-shrews-and-pitcher-plants-this-tree-shrew-is-shitting.html
…
3 Likes
Quite shrewd indeed.
3 Likes
There are North American pitcher plants (Sarracenia and Darlingtonia), South American pitcher plants (Heliamphora), and Australian pitcher plants (Cephalotus).
None of them are as amazingly diverse as Nepenthes. I’m not surprised they’ve developed some creative symbiotic relationships.
2 Likes
This is the sort of thing that would have been flogged to death in all the “Amazing Animal Factz!” literature of my youth. (Such literature still persists, surely?)
Did no one really notice this earlier, or have the plants just changed that much in the last few decades?
2 Likes
David Attenborough makes rodent pooping sound so dignified.
1 Like
It’s very likely the latter. Nepenthes didn’t get a lot of attention for a long time and some older books on growing carnivorous plants (and by “older” I mean published in the 1970s or 80s) treat the whole genus as too difficult to cultivate to be worthy of any interest. There are several that are easy to grow but this one is so specialized probably only experts studying it in the field knew about it earlier.
1 Like
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
