After millions of years, why are carnivorous plants still so small?
19 comments
·June 13, 2025IAmBroom
NegativeLatency
Sorta similar with a lot of plants I imagine, we planted a Madrone tree and it's very tempting to want to water a small & new tree but they can also get root issues if the ground is too wet or doesn't drain well enough. They're highly adapted to living on the sides of cliffs.
ge96
I've been trying to grow a mango from a seed for so long. The roots always get hit by black fungus and it dies off. Tallest I got one to grow was about 10"
_tom_
You are assuming that they haven't.
Brambles can trap sheep, benefiting from the sheep as fertilizer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrGobnZq83g
Falling coconuts can not only kill people, but probably kill far more small animals, again benefiting from them as fertilizer,
ethbr1
Came to HN for tech news, left with a disturbing realization that coconut trees might be low-key carnivorous.
username135
Right?!
Affric
If plants moved faster we would be absolutely terrified of them.
bilsbie
A related question is why plants in general can thrive on such tiny amounts of protein. (Nitrogen)
almosthere
We haven't had an unscheduled total eclipse of the sun with people singing in the background yet.
colecut
have they tried feeding them alllll niiight loooong
leoedin
Larger animals tend to more intelligent - presumably there’s a natural limit to the size of prey a carnivorous plant can reliably catch from a static location.
IAmBroom
Counterpoint: mice and at least one monkey baby have died in pitcher plants in the wild.
jonplackett
Isn’t this still just the original point though, mice ain’t that big!
Sevii
Plants not being able to chew or tear their prey is a big disadvantage.
null
bell-cot
As soon as a carnivorous plant gets big enough to be eating young mammals, it hits the Mama Bear barrier. With motivation, even a tiny mammal can do an enormous amount of damage to a plant.
hirvi74
Some carnivorous plants do eat mammals. Though not primarily, some pitcher plant species have been known to eat mice, for example.
nyeah
tl;dr Basically a lot of sorry excuses.
If you're a plant, don't buy into the negativity. Work your way up the food chain. If you eat it, then it's your food.
AStonesThrow
[dead]
OK, I wrote my theory, and then read the article: same.
But I will add that a commercial grower of venus flytraps once got curious, and took a few thousand cloned plantings, growing them in a variety of conditions. As soon as the soil became nourishing, the plants would die. Post mortem seemed to indicate their roots were fungally attacked.
So: plant adapts to living in a food desert (not an actual one, of course; it has to be wet for the carnivory to work, as the article points out). Plant gains weirdo digestion abilities, but at the same time, it no longer needs expensive anti-fungal defences - because the ground isn't rich enough to support parasitic fungi.
Then: human adds the nutrients back in. Boom! The ordinary fungus in the air, which has a tough time invading grass or tree or tobacco or pepper roots (because they have extensive defences, like capsaicin), lands in the rich soil of pretty-much helpless flytrap roots, and has a buffet.