SUNDEW FAMILY. Droseracex. 



SUNDEW FAMILY. Droseracece. 



Bog plants with sticky-hairy leaves which are coated 

 with a fluid designed to attract and retain insects they 

 are, in fact, carnivorous. The small flowers are perfect, 

 with five petals, and few or many stamens, with the an- 

 thers turned outward. Fruit a 1-5-celled capsule. The 

 tiny red filaments of the leaves curl and clasp about a 

 captured insect, and ultimately its juices are absorbed. 



A very small plant with long-stemmed 

 s "" e ^ ea round leaves lying close to or upon the 

 Drosera ground, both leaf and stem covered with 



rotundifolia long, fine, red hairs. The red flower-stem- 



Whjte is erect and smooth, and bears about four 



July-August or gix gmall white flowerS; which are fre . 



quently visited by the fungous gnats and other small 

 woodland insects. The flower-cluster is one-sided, bends 

 over, and the blossoms open one at a time only in the 

 sunshine. The glands of the leaves exude clear drops of 

 fluid, which appear like small dewdrops ; hence the 

 popular name, also the Greek dpo6spo$, meaning dewy. 

 The whole plant is so saturated with color that its sap 

 stains paper a ruddy madder purple. 4-9 inches high. 

 In bogs, from Me. , south, and west to the Daks. 

 Lone-leaved ^ very similar species, but with elon- 

 Sundew gated blunt-tipped leaves whose stems are 



Drosera inter- long and rather erect. Differing furfher 

 media, var. from the preceding species by the naked 

 Americana , ,, , , . . , 



leaf-stems, the red hairs appearing only 



upon the little leaves. It is not so common as the other, 

 species, but occupies about the same territory. 

 Slender -^ western species with 3-inch long, slen- 



Sundew der or linear leaves, also with naked, erect 



Drosera stems. The white flowers are few. Shores 



of Lakes Superior and Huron. 



_. The leaves of this larger species are re- 



Sundew duced to a mere threadlike shape with no 



Drosera distinct stem ; they are glandular, red 



filiformis hairy throughout, the hairs terminated by 



a red bead or dot. The flowers are fully 

 inch broad, and dull purple - magenta. 



