Smells so good! Pitcher plants stop eating bugs and start eating feces, and they're actually doing better!

Due to their cute shapes and unique habits, carnivorous pitcher plants have become very popular ornamental plants in recent years. Some people even believe that they can attract wealth because their "stomachs" can hold a lot of things. However, the following fact may change your view of them: some pitcher plants have quietly given up eating insects and switched to eating feces.

Is it worth it? Evolution tells us that it is. A new study recently found that from a nutritional point of view, the feces-eating pitcher plants are better off than similar species that insist on eating insects.

Please go to the toilet｜wikimedia commons

Grown like a toilet

The coprophagous pitcher plant is found mainly in the high mountains of Borneo in Southeast Asia.

Borneo has extremely rich biodiversity and is a paradise for insect research, but at high altitudes, insects can no longer bear it . The pitcher plants on the mountains cannot get enough food, so they gradually turn to another source of nutrition - feces.

The Nepenthes rajah is one of the best. It is the largest pitcher plant, with a pitcher that can grow to 30-40 centimeters long and can store up to two liters of water, which is equivalent to a sports bottle.

To grow to this size, the plant must have enough nutrition. To this end, the Malay rajah pitcher plant has evolved a larger opening and rougher edges, allowing small animals such as tree shrews and mice to squat on it steadily , licking the syrup secreted from the pitcher plant lid while defecating.

Rattus baluensis visiting Nepenthes rajah at night｜Ch'ien Lee/Wikimedia/CC BY 2.5

Incidentally, Nepenthes rajah was named in the 19th century in honor of Sir James Brooke, the first white rajah (king) of the Kingdom of Sarawak. Now that seems like a rather impolite name.

Take a step back and the world will be wider

Nepenthes originally ate feces out of necessity, but a recent study found that the benefits of doing so outweigh those of eating insects: Nepenthes that eat mammal feces can obtain twice as much nitrogen as similar species that do not eat feces.

Nepenthes rajah and Nepenthes macrophylla are mainly supplied by mountain tree shrews. The authors of the study said that if calculated by dry weight, the nitrogen content in tree shrew feces is not as high as that of ants, but it has a large and stable supply, which makes it more nutritious .

Nepenthes macrophylla (D) and Nepenthes rajah (E, N. macrophylla) eating feces | academic.oup.com

Nepenthes hemsleyana (N. hemsleyana) has reached a happy cooperation with Hardwickian bats (Kerivoula hardwickii), whose "bottles" provide comfortable and hidden homes for bats, and the bats leave excrement for them to supplement their meals . According to the study authors, the "room occupancy rate" during the survey period reached 20%, which means that one out of every five pitcher pitchers of Nepenthes hemsleyana was inhabited by a bat.

Some pitcher plants have adapted to eating bird droppings, and the local white-eye bird (Chlorocharis emiliae) often visits. Although the nutritional value of bird droppings is slightly inferior to that of mammals, it is still better than that of insects.

But then again, don't most plants use their roots to eat shit? These pitcher plants are just going back to square one.

Nepenthes surviving

Most carnivorous plants such as pitcher plants and sundews were born in a barren environment, such as the soil of a tropical rainforest or flowing water. In order to survive better, especially to supplement the key nitrogen and phosphorus elements , they evolved the habit of eating insects. Now some pitcher plants have switched to eating feces, and they only need to slightly adjust the structure originally used for catching insects.

Flies have big hearts｜Laurence Gaume, Yoel Forterre.

Scientists first confirmed that pitcher plants eat feces around 2009. However, the structure of these pitcher plants has been fully adapted to this "diet", and they have reached a tacit understanding with tree shrews, indicating that they may have been eating feces for a long time .

After the pitcher plant grows out of the "bottle", it still takes some time to produce syrup, so that the tree shrew can eat the syrup and poop happily. When the food is ready, its inner surface will turn dark, sending a signal to the tree shrew that it is "open for business." Jonathan Moran, a researcher at Royal Roads University in Canada, was one of the first scientists to discover this phenomenon. He said that it is rare to see pitcher plants violently destroyed by hungry tree shrews in the wild, indicating that the two have adapted to each other.

Tupaia montana and Nepenthes lowii | Ch'ien Lee

There are no known dung-eating pitcher plants outside of Borneo, and there are still many mysteries to be uncovered. However, due to the expansion of agriculture and tourism in Southeast Asia, the already struggling pitcher plants are in trouble - 40% of the known species in the genus Nepenthes are vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered .

In the past two years, there has been a trend of taking photos and videos with Boko Nepenthes because some people think it looks like a penis. The Cambodian government has also issued a reminder to tourists, begging everyone not to pick Boko Nepenthes, as these pitchers are important to their survival .

N. bokorensis | François MEY/Wikimedia/CC BY 3.0

The tiny pitcher plants have tall trees competing for sunlight above them, and other small flowers, grasses and fungi competing for nutrients under their feet. Even in such a harsh environment, they still survive to this day and have evolved a variety of interesting characteristics. Today, we humans tell its story, and the future of the story is in our hands.

A warm reminder: if you have a pitcher plant (or other carnivorous plants) at home, you don’t have to catch it and feed it insects all day long, and don’t feed it feces!

References

[1]Adam T Cross, Antony van der Ent, Miriam Wickmann, Laura M Skates, Sukaibin Sumail, Gerhard Gebauer, Alastair Robinson, Capture of mammal excreta by Nepenthes is an effective heterotrophic nutrition strategy, Annals of Botany, Volume 130, Issue 7, December 2022, Pages 927–938, https://doi.org/10.1093/aob/mcac134

[2]Some carnivorous plants evolved to eat poop instead of bugs. And they're better off for it. https://www.livescience.com/poop-eating-pitcher-plants-nutrients

[3]Nepenthes rajahhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nepenthes_rajah

[4]Clarke Charles M., Bauer Ulrike, Lee Ch'ien C., Tuen Andrew A., Rembold Katja and Moran Jonathan A. 2009 Tree shrew lavatories: a novel nitrogen sequestration strategy in a tropical pitcher plant. Biol. Lett. 5632–635, http://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2009.0311

[5]Pitcher Plant Doubles as Toilet https://www.livescience.com/9666-pitcher-plant-doubles-toilet.html

[6]Stop picking carnivorous penis plants, Cambodian environmental officials plead https://www.livescience.com/carnivorous-penis-pitcher-plant-picked

Author: Maya Blue

Edit: Small towel

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