Its crazy that it smells so delicious to attract bugs , then it has hair sensors all over. The hair sensors are designed in a way not too get fooled by rain and debris
This really made me think for a minute. That’s why their children don’t exist though right? And the ones which don’t think that look appetising live on! Sounds right
I mean that's how evolution works tho. The spiders who aren't attracted to Venus fly traps or have an aversion to them are more likely to pass on those genes. It's just not a common enough killer to have enough pressure to cause that selection, or maybe it's too complex for a random mutation to cause avoidance.
Agreed. Inside? Yeah get rid of it. Woodpile 30 ft from house, it's gonna try to run. Bite if pinched or cornered. Also not super deadly like people think. Same with the recluse. Underlying genetic factors like allergies determines outcome.
Again you don't want 30 of these just hanging out in your home. Much like they don't want millions of us removing their homes.
Because Venus flytraps will let some creatures eat its sweetness then get away, a certain number of hairs has to trigger before it'll snap shut, you can see how much the spider moves around in it before triggering
They maybe evolve to avoid it, but that takes hundreds of not thousands of years.
They do not learn, they do not talk they just go out and hunt and breed. That's it.
Plants don't have instincts, they have no brains. The ones that didn't make sap that lured insects didn't survive long enough to pass on their genes and so were selected out of their gene pool
Evolution and adaptation was never about "I need this trait to survive so I should acquire it," but rather "haha look at that freak with the flippers oh shit I'm drowning save me flipper-boy"
Yeah I know, I was using the same language they did for conversational purposes.
"Instinct" in my case is just evolution. I used the same term to denote it's tasty juices are an innate feature, which indeed are a result of evolution and not instinct.
If enough bugs didn't find it tasty/alluring, the plants wouldn't exist cause they'd have starved.
Thats not how that works. Spiders are solitary animals and are usually alone when they hunt for prey or when they get eaten by a plant. Therefore not many other spiders would have witnessed that plant kill anyway and even if they had they would not tell any other spider because they live solitary!
As this appears to be a male, I imagine there being a lady friend off-camera yelling at him:
“I told you, Steve! I fucking told you not to dance around on that thing! I fucking said, I FUCKING SAID my friend saw someone get eaten by one of those. But you were all like ‘that’s just silly girl talk, babe’ and now HERE YOU ARE BEING DIGESTED. Ya know what, my mother was right about you…”
EDIT: oh hell it’s a lady (thanks for the corrections!)…serves me right for blindly listening to my husband when he confidently stated it was a male. My bad, y’all
I really hate to do this to you. That is in no way shape or form a male... Males are small, tan or gray, and very not shiny. They resemble more of a brown recluse than a black widow. Misinformation is misinformation.
If you look at that and are afraid it's female. If you look at that and say "what kind of spider" it's male. Those ladies are fierce.
The video is staged crap to generate clicks. Knowing the ecology of these plants and widow spiders, there is a near zero chance they’d ever interact in nature.
They just killed a spider that they bred or bought for no good reason. Widows don’t actively hunt, and the plants offer terrible nesting habitat for widows.
Pretty sure the spider is too big for the plant, too. It won’t be able to seal itself properly and the juices will leak out, leading to most or all of this meal being wasted. In the long run I think this interaction ends up hurting the plant.
Poor venomous spider. Widows, while dangerous if provoke, are pretty peaceful and quite beautiful. Also great at fighting pest much like the house centipede. While you don't want them inside they're fine bumbling about outdoors.
Yes I know this is a contentious topic because "spider, burn the house down!". Don't obliterate the votes please.
On the other hand. Australian insects? Feel free to burn that shit to the ground.
I've also heard that they're not quite as deadly as people say. They'll kill a small kid, maybe even a very light-weight person. They'll definitely make a large person very ill. But I have heard that the survival rate is higher than one might think.
And for the even more important factoid: Apparently they got their reputation for being so scary, because of outhouses. Back when toilets were just a building outside with a hole in the ground, the black widows would make nests in the opening. Men would sit down, get their ... sensitive area bit.
With indoor plumbing, the rate of black widow bites has gone way down.
I agree that they're beautiful. I think of all the spiders, they have a really lovely shape. I actually have the outline of one on a cushion because it's so pretty
Nah fuck all that I grew up in CA these fuckers are everywhere they hide in boots, absolutely infest eaves and wood of any sort regardless of where it is, I douse it all in spider killer. Absolutely horrifying. House centipedes are stupid cat toys. Now wolf spiders I leave alone, I appreciate them eating the more venomous spoods
Nah the plant doesn't release the digestives juices immediately. It tries to fully close the trap first.
It needs to get a good seal, so the digestives chemicals can work properly, and also not get spilled, along with allowing time for strong/big prey to actually be able to get out.
It doesn't want to waste more energy than it needs to. So waiting for the trap to fully seal first is just a win-win in all scenarios for it.
So it's actually the opposite. Most prey animals get eaten alive while still seeing the world. Anything grabbed by a Venus fly trap get plunged into darkness before the feast begins.
I remember hearing that the nector of Venus flytraps also are intoxicating, which could be the reason why the BW spider forgot to stand in the safe position
So I own one and nurture it a lot so it has been thriving indoors which many find difficult to do. Traps die all the time, it's common. Some of them can go through multiple cycles of digesting prey (closing and opening), some die after a single cycle and some die with no cycles at all. More than likely, the plant will feed on its own even if insects are scarce. I constantly catch my plant having closed traps with insects inside that I don't even notice in my home. Usually they're houseflies but can also be smaller bugs. Digesting insects works like a fertilizer for the plant, yet it can't tolerate any fertilizer in the soil, it will immediately kill it.
If you play with the traps too much, it will die. Closing and opening the traps requires a lit of energy for the plant, and should not be happening unless there's a net positive in energy.
There are a few things that are important to know about these plants. You don't necessarily need to feed them, they will grow fine but limited with only water. If you do manually feed them, an insect of that size like in this video, is considered a bit too large for that trap. And if you do feed them, it's better to use easily digested insects like houseflies, mosquitoes and similar types.
If you feed it a dead insect, you need to manually stimulate the trap by caressing it for at least a few minutes and monitor it to ensure it has closed down until it's completely sealed. Otherwise it'll open back up. The trap triggers when something touches the tiny hairs (thin spikes) inside the trap, on both sides within a couple of seconds. If the prey is not alive to fight inside, the trap will not completely seal. It's a defense mechanism for the plant where the traps can trigger from random events such as wind, leafs falling etc., and starting the digestive process consumes a lot of energy for the plant so in most cases, it will abort and re-open the trap.
You can't use tap water unless you're filtering to below 20 ppm. The best thing for the plant is to use distilled water, preferably with as low ppm as possible. I use distilled water. The plant likes to have its feet wet, which means you water it by filling a tray a few centimeters and let the pot rest in it. If you water it top down, the plant will most likely die due to being too wet/damp near the traps and leaves. If you use normal tap water, the roots will rot and it will die.
The plant needs a lot of light. Preferably between 8-12 hours a day. If you don't have access to that amount of light, a growth lamp is mandatory. I'm growing mine in the far north, and a growth lamp works perfectly fine. I have to water it every single day, and when I'm away for longer periods of times, I put it in a wider tray and slightly deeper water to make it last longer.
Summer stalks grow tall, winter stalks grow near the base. So it looks different depending on the season. Red colour inside the traps signals a happy plant. Only green means it is lacking a bit of light, which is common at the end of summer. The plant grows the best with peat moss or sphagnum moss, not too tightly packed.
It's a very cute and interesting plant, but if you don't care for it the way it needs and monitor it properly, it will die. Most people kill them within a few months. Here is minea couple of months after summer was over and before I brought out the growth lamp. More than half of the tall stalks have now been cut off as you can tell early on they're going to die off.
And here it is now with the more "winter traps" developed with the growth light, and the last of the summer stalks looking pale yellow or black as they die off. Basically the traps grow much shorter and closer to the soil when it's slightly colder and less intense sunlight. But the growth light stimulates them enough to turn red still.
I can't honestly tell you from experience because I have never killed one, but I am quite certain there's no strict range of number that will kill the plant if you fall below it. When I first bought mine, it had 3 traps, and one died quite quickly. I was stuck with 2 smaller traps and a tall flower which I later learned has no real function and only serves as energy drain. Apparently the traps themselves give off some substance that attracts the insects. Maybe the flower is just a "look here" type of thing, but expensive to grow. I have a picture of it a couple of months after purchase before I repotted it and cut off the flower, and basically it went from 2 traps to this in a very short time.
From what I understand, the traps are not vital for its survival, though non-mineralized water is. So as long as you water it with either rain water, RO-filtered water or distilled water, it will stay alive even if you cut off all the traps. Light, of course... Although it will grow much better and faster if it has traps that actively digest on appropriate insects. I saw the difference when I placed it in the balcony, and opened a window. It would catch multiple insects every week, and normally if you're manually feeding, once every three weeks is sufficient.
I don't think it will die if you strip it, as long as the soil is appropriate and you water it. The roots will still be healthy, and these tiny little paddles keep popping up, folding out and opening. You can see the small baby traps coming out if you zoom in.
Most common type of carnivorous plants are bladderworts but there's also Venus fly traps, Sundews, Butterworts, sarracenias, a lot of pitcher plant types or nepenthes. There's many types. Source: I grow a lot of them for fun
Pretty sure there are a few others but these are the most common. Mom used to buy me one every spring and I'd inevitably kill it by falsely triggering them to close.
I think it takes a fair amount of the plant's energy to close. If it keeps doing that because some goofball keeps triggering it over and over for funsies, it will die. I think.
Ppl here acting like spiders would learn stuff, and teach their kids over generations....
WTF do you guys think? That insects and archinids are talking to their kids or something?? Smh
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u/Accomplished_Ad5811 8h ago
This played out like the 1st victim in a horror movie