December 20, 2014

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Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online

Carnivorous plants are so named because they capture and digest tiny creatures for nutritional purposes, but new research published Thursday in the journal Annals ofBotany suggests that they are capable of overcoming their natural instincts and converting to vegetarianism.

According to the website Science 2.0, researchers from the University of Vienna report that the aquatic carnivorous bladderwort, which can be found in many lakes and ponds worldwide, dines not only on small animals but also algae and pollen grains if prey animals are hard to find.

This practice can improve the evolutionary fitness of the bladderworts if they properly balance animals and algae, wrote Marianne Koller-Peroutka and Wolfram Adlassnig of the University of Viennas Core Facility Cell Imaging and Ultrastructure Research and colleagues from the Silver-Stable Isotope Lab and the Gregor Mendel Institute for Molecular Plant Biology.

Aquatic bladderworts catch their prey with highly sophisticated suction traps consisting of little bladders that produce a hydrostatic under pressure, the study authors said in a statement. A valve-like trap door opens upon stimulation and the surrounding water including tiny organism flushes in rapidly within three milliseconds.

Once the prey enters the trap, it dies of suffocation, and the bladderworts digestive enzymes begin to degrade it. Due to the minerals provided by those prey organisms, the aquatic creatures are able to live and propagate, even when their habitats are extremely poor in nutrients.

Algae was first observed within the traps of bladderworts (Utricularia) as early as 1900, but their role within the prey spectrum is just now being analyzed. The authors looked at prey objects in over 2,000 traps, and found that just 10 percent were animals while 50 percent were algae. More algae was present in those living in nutrient poor habitats such as peat bogs, they added.

Over one-third of the prey consisted of pollen grain from trees growing on shore areas of the home waters, they added, but the bladderworts do not appear to select what it eats. Rather, it sucks in all living things, plant or animal, that are small enough to fit within its trap.

See the rest here:
Yes, that's a vegetarian, meat-eating plant