Rare And Exotic Plants

Rat-Eating Pitcher Plant (Nepenthes attenboroughii)

Even the most benign of pitcher plants is strange and amazing, but the species discovered in August 2009 may just be the weirdest carnivorous plant yet. It’s believed to be the largest meat-eating plant in the world, and is capable of digesting rats. Scientists found it on Mount Victoria in the Philippines and named it after famed nature broadcaster Sir David Attenborough.

Hydnora africana

This plant isn’t just unattractive, rising out of the ground like the head of a blind sea snake and opening its jaws to the world. It smells like feces, too. A parasitic plant that attaches itself to the roots of other species, Hydnora africana emits its pungent odor to attract carrion beetles and dung beetles, its natural pollinators.

Dead Horse Arum Lily (Helicodiceros muscivorus)

When a plant’s name has the words ‘dead horse’ in it, you know it’s bad news. H. muscivorus is a giant flower bearing the distinct scent of rotting meat, meant to draw in female blowflies which it captures inside its swollen cavity and holds there through its first night after flowering. It releases the flies, now covered in pollen, the following day to move on to neighboring H. muscivorus plants.

Flypaper Plant (Pinguicula gigantea)

Call them opportunists, but butterworts – also known as flypaper plants – will grab hold of anything that lands on their leaves and immediately start digesting it. The upper surface of the plant is covered in sticky digestive enzymes to trap victims like mosquitoes and gnats, but it can also absorb nutrients from pollen.

Welwitschia mirabilis

If this desert plant looks like it came straight out of the age of dinosaurs, that’s because it did. Two succulent leaves continuously grow from the short, thick trunk, splitting over time into strap-shaped sections. The leaves can reach twelve feet in length. These odd plants are considered living fossils and can live up to 2,000 years.

Waterwheel Plant (Aldrovanda Vesiculosa)

Closely related to the Venus flytrap, the aquatic, free-floating waterwheel plant has similar snap-traps on the end of each ‘spoke’ emerging from the main stem. Each trap is covered in ‘trigger hairs’ that cause the trap to close when stimulated.