Venus flytraps snap shut to make a meal of insects and spidersJeanne Bourdier, Corentin Mollier
The mystery of how a Venus flytrap closes fast enough to catch insect prey may have been partially solved.
Venus flytraps (Dionaea muscipula) are triggered to snap shut once hairs in their traps are touched twice in short succession. They are known to be able to catch an array of insects, and even small frogs, and yet how they work has eluded scientists since Charles Darwin.
It has been widely thought that the mechanism involves water being pumped from one side of the trap to the other through the tissue. This would cause one side to shrink and the other to swell, generating the curvature needed to close the trap.
To test this hypothesis, Yoël Forterre at Aix-Marseille University in France and his colleagues measured how long it takes for water to move through the trap, both through the individual cells and the plant’s tissue.
