The fascinating world of carnivorous plants

The giant plant that feeds on human blood in the 1986 movie "Little Shop of Horrors," Audrey II, may be an extreme example. But carnivorous plants do exist, though on a much smaller scale. They trap and consume small animals, mostly insects, and use their nutrients to grow and develop. They live on all continents except Antarctica.

Researchers from Australia and Germany have discovered several new species of Drosera microphylla, carnivorous plants endemic to western Australia. The scientists didn't happen upon the plants on a field trip, but on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, where hobby scientists and nature photographers had shared pictures of the "golden rainbow."

Another Drosera species is Drosera rotundifolia. It grows across northern Europe, Siberia, large parts of northern North America, Korea and Japan, but is also found as far south as New Guinea and California, Mississippi and Alabama in the US. It developed carnivorous behavior because the soil in its habitat is usually poor in nutrients.

The largest carnivorous plant is Nepenthes rajah, a pitcher plant species. It can be found on Mount Kinabalu and Mount Tambuyukon on the island of Borneo. Its urn-shaped pitcher trap can grow up to 41 centimeters (16 inches) tall and 20 centimeters (7.9 inches) wide. Insects make up the majority of its prey, but rats, frogs, lizards and even birds have drowned in the plant's digestive fluids.

It sounds counterintiutive: Sleeping in a carnivorous plant?! But the Hardwicke's woolly bat on Borneo is making it work. It is a reciprocal relationship: The bat sleeps in the pitcher of Nepenthes plants, and the plants feed on the bat's poop. Rather than fall down into the digestive fluid at the bottom of the pitcher, the bat sticks in the plant like a cork on a bottle.

These pretty flowers are commonly known under the strange name butterworts, but the Latin name for the genus is Pinguicula. The carnivorous plant uses its sticky leaves to lure, trap and digest insects. The largest number of Pinguicula species grow in South and Central America.

Sarracenia plants grow in North America and are commonly known as trumpet pitchers. They attract insects with a secretion on the lip of the pitcher leaves. The leaves' colors and scents are also appealing to insects. The pitcher's slippery rim causes insects to fall inside, where they die and are digested so the plant can use the nutrients.

Perhaps the most famous carnivorous plant is the Venus flytrap. It captures insects and spiders with its leaves, which are equipped with tiny hairs. When an animal crawling along the leaf touches a hair, the trap prepares to close. It snaps shut if a second contact occurs within roughly 20 seconds of the first.