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NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [14:5— May, 1918 



food for the plant. When the balloon had extracted from the 

 little animal all the nutriment there was to be had, it shriveled up 

 and fell from the stem. It thus served as a coffin for the minute 

 bones of the victim. 



Why the tadpoles should have entered the balloons was not 

 wholly clear. They may have .expected to find food within. 

 Perhaps the spherical cavities seemed to them to offer a cosy 

 retreat. The bristles around the doors evidently had not deterred 

 them. These bristles appeared to have as their function the 

 warding off of larger animals. 



The strange thing, from the point of science, was that the 



bladderwort should have fed 

 on vertebrates. Dr. C. F. 

 Hodge, the famous naturalist 

 connected with the University 

 of Oregon, was lecturing at the 

 school when the incident oc- 

 curred. After verifying all 

 the details, he stated that it 

 seemed to add a fact to the 

 sum total of knowledge regard- 

 ing plants that feed on animals. 

 In all his years of study and 

 research, he said, he had never 

 found or heard of a plant that 

 would make vertebrates its 

 food. 



Why not Mosquito 

 Catcher? 

 There are about 500 species 

 of plants that capture and 

 devour animals, generally in a 

 in a manner more or less simi- 

 lar to that here described. But 

 these animals are, for the most 



Diagram of Traps of Bladderwort 



From "Life of Inland Waters" 

 A . — A bladder seen from lower side- B. — A section 

 of a bladder showing valve at v; xyz, epidermal hairs 



parts insects. The carnivorous plants are therefore generally known 

 as "insectivorous plants." Their other prey are nearly microscopic 

 crustaceans of various kinds, such as the cyclops and daphnia. 

 Among the better known insectivorous plants are the sundew, the 

 pitcher plant, and Venus' fly-trap. 



