Sundews!

I've been hunting for, and finding, carnivorous sundew plants in the New Jersey pine barrens. Three kinds grow there: spoonleaf, roundleaf, and threadleaf. The common names tell you the shapes to look for. All of them are covered with sticky tentacles that secrete mucilage that is attractive and deadly to insects. Click to enlarge this spoonleaf, also called oblong- or spatulate-leaved sundew, Drosera intermedia.

There are spoonleaf sundews growing all over this floating log. If an insects lands on one it will get trapped and digested and its nutrients will be absorbed.

The threadleaf sundew, Drosera filiformis, is slender and lovely.

And it has tiny delicate flowers that are open right now.

The one I have most trouble finding is the roundleaf sundew,
Drosera rotundifolia. It's small and low to the ground and blends in remarkably well for a bright red glittering thing. This whole plant is about two inches across.

Look for sundews in places like this.

A Closer Look

I saw this leopard frog beside a pond in the New Jersey Pine Barrens and snapped its picture. When I looked more closely I noticed that it was sitting on sphagnum moss and its right front paw is touching a carnivorous spoon-leaf sundew plant, Drosera intermedia.

Click to enlarge.

A spoon-leaf sundew. Those shiny droplets are sticky and insects get trapped in them and slowly digested to supplement the plant's diet. I wonder if the frog's foot got sticky.

There were other carnivorous plants around the pond including the purple pitcher plants pictured here, Sarracenia purpurea.

I took a photo of this rain-filled pitcher. Insects are attracted to the plant, slip into the water, and cannot get out because of downward facing hairs. They are eventually digested and supplement the plant's diet.

When I looked more closely at the photo I saw some insect trapping going on.

The ant on the left is in a dangerous spot. Those on the right have already been trapped.

Speaking of small things, I also saw this small, rare, and hard-to-find plant: the Little Curly Grass Fern, Schizaea pusilla. It's been called the most famous plant in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. I attest that you have to be on your hands and knees to find it. The plant rarely gets higher than about three inches. The curled green grass-like leaves are sterile. The brown upright leaves are taller, fertile, and produce spores from a comb-like structure at the top (there is one in this photo). The things you see when you take a closer look!