It’s time for a little curiosity. And yes, I know. You well educated and intelligent readers of this blog probably know that carnivorous is a better and more accurate expression than flesh-eating, but hey – carnivorous sounds boring. Flesh-eating sounds cool.

In the area where I have been travelling lately there are two plants that have decided that it is a good idea to supplement their diet with small animals. Or, to be precise – insects. I have seen these plants in the mountains all of my life. This time I was able to snap some cool macro images of them.

The sundew is both beautiful and scary looking. It has leaves with small drops of stalked mucilagenous glands. The small drops are sticky and sweet. They both attract and trap insects. Once trapped, the plant starts to bend the leave to completely secure the prey. It then uses enzymes to dissolve parts of the insect and absorbs the nutrition through its leaves.

Another agressive little fellow is the common butterwort. A small plant with blue flowers. On the ground it has greeen leaves that is coated with a sticky slime that traps insects. Once trapped the plant release enzymes and digests its prey.

The norwegian mountains during summer is probably one of the safest places on earth. Still there are pretty scary things going on if you have a look at the details…

All the images here are snapped by Eirik Solheim and can be used non commercially through this creative commons license. For commercial use please contact me.