Insectivorous Plants

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Title page of Insect-Eating Plants (German first edition from 1876)

Insectivorous plants (English: Insectivorous Plants ), first published in late 1875 by the British naturalist Charles Darwin , is the fundamental work in the research of carnivorous plants . In the work Darwin proved experimentally the existence of the carnivory in the plant kingdom .

History of origin

In the summer of 1860 Darwin was out on a heather in Sussex where the round-leaved sundew was abundant . He was surprised by the large number of insects that the plants caught with their leaves and picked up twelve plants, which he examined more closely at home. He found that of the plants' 56 fully grown leaves, 31 had caught insects, found that most of the prey was flies and that the largest prey was a butterfly ( Coenonympha pamphilus ).

Stimulated thereof began Darwin extensive experiments on the round-leaved sundew, subsequently complemented by experiments on six other sundews , and the Venus fly trap ( Dionaea muscipula ), the water trap ( Aldrovanda vesiculosa ), the drosophyllum ( Drosophyllum lusitanicum ), two Fettkraut TYPES ( Pinguicula ) , several water hoses ( Utricularia ) and observations and investigations on bug plants ( Roridula dentata ), rainbow plants ( Byblis gigantea ) and trap traps ( Genlisea ). In addition, he also examined some other plant species (e.g. the Virginian tobacco Nicotiana tabacum ), which were known to catch insects.

Darwin succeeded in definitively proving that the sundew plants examined , the pigeon leaf and the fatty herbs were specially equipped for catching insects and their digestion and absorption of the dissolved nutrients. He also suspected the carnivory for numerous other species or genera, but could not prove it, since he mostly only had herbarium material available, especially for non-European species .

Darwin first presented the results of his work together with Joseph Dalton Hooker at a lecture in Belfast , and in autumn 1875 they appeared as a book with illustrations by the hand of his sons George and Francis . Francis Darwin also got a second revised edition in 1888. A German translation by Julius Victor Carus appeared as early as 1876 , further translations into other languages ​​quickly followed, as early as 1878 a Russian, an Italian and a French edition were available, further editions followed, in 1983 one in Chinese language.

effect

Even after his lecture on July 3, 1875, the journal Scientific American reported extensively on the subject of "Carnivorous Plants". Despite the detailed and thorough experimental approach, the botanist Eduard August von Regel described Darwin's work as “scientific junk” and wrote that “Darwin's theory of the movement phenomena in some insect-catching plants is one of those theories about which any intelligent botanist can easily would have laughed - if this theory weren't based on the celebrated Darwin… ”. Until the 1920s, there were always authors who denied Darwin's results.

Regardless of this, the work is still considered to be an important basis for research literature on carnivorous plants and is still cited.

Individual evidence

  1. a b c Charles Darwin: Insect-eating plants. In: Ch. Darwin's collected works. Vol. 8, E. Schweizerbart'sche Verlagshandlung (E. Koch), Stuttgart 1876
  2. ^ A b Wilhelm Barthlott, Stefan Porembski, Rüdiger Seine, Inge Theisen: Karnivoren , 2004, p. 11, ISBN 3-8001-4144-2
  3. ^ A b Entry on The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online - University of Cambridge
  4. ^ Digitized and full text in the German Text Archive
  5. Quoted from: Georg Stehli: Pflanzen auf Insektenfang , 1934, p. 31

Web links

Wikisource: Insectivorous Plants  - Sources and full texts