I’m just back from a few days with family in Sebastapol, up in the Russian River and Sonoma Valley wine country north of San Francisco. I’ll post on the garden destinations I managed to drag people to while we were up there, but I’ll start backwards with one of the events on the way home yesterday.
On the return trip the car was plagued for a few minutes by this fly that kept buzzing around the inside of the car, evading all our attempts to shoo it out the windows. In the back seat we had three plants that were my souvenirs from a visit to California Carnivores, a carnivorous plant specialty nursery that was just five minutes form the hotel where we stayed. (I’ll post more on the nursery visit later.)
One of the plants was this sundew, Drosera filiformis ssp. filiformis ‘Florida Giant.’ Well, I think you know where this story is headed…
When we got home John noticed that a fly had been trapped by the sundew, most likely the one that had been annoying us at the beginning of the trip. That explains why we hadn’t noticed the insect after the first few minutes of the return trip.
After this experience I’d like to suggest that every automotive manufacturer should make a drosera standard equipment on all their models, especially for this buggy time of the year…
Ha! Funny. Not sure a fly eating plant would like my plant but I sure do hate those flies in the car!
Nice one, James.
Did you stay around for the digestive process 🙂 I wonder what acids are in those globules.
Excellent! My plants made it home in o.k. shape. A little squashed, but not too much worse for the wear. After wandering through California Carnivores, I have plans to rework my bog garden.
ooooh, I’ve heard about California Carnivores, I believe I read the book by the owner if I’m remembering rightly…I ENVY you. You are inspiring me to make a field trip there myself. And I think insect-catching plants in cars might be just the kind of innovation that could save the auto industry.
P.S. love the first drosera photo, especially.