Sundew returns after hundred years missing
THE great sundew is our own little Venus Flytrap, and it has been missing from North West England for more than 100 years, but I am pleased to report that my friends at Chester Zoo say that, it is making a comeback.
Changes in land use across the country for agriculture has led to the drying of the moist wetlands the plants need to survive, and since the turn of the 19th century, drainage, eutrophication and peat extraction have nearly driven the great sundew out of England entirely.
On the face of it eutrophication, from the Greek ‘eutrophos,’ or ‘well-nourished,’ sounds a good thing, unfortunately when a body of water becomes overly enriched with nutrients it induces excessive growth of algae and results in oxygen depletion, and therefore not so good for plants.
In a partnership with the Zoo, Lancashire Wildlife Trust and pioneering young conservationist, Joshua Styles, the plant has been reintroduced to a number of key sites in our region and it is hoped they will now thrive and reproduce in the protected areas.
Joshua said: “If we were to do nothing, it is extremely likely that this carnivorous plant would become extinct in England in the very near future.”
The leaves of this striking plant are coated in many tiny tentacles, tipped with droplets of what at first appears to be morning dew – giving the plant its name. They are actually globules of a really sticky, sweet-smelling liquid which is simply irresistible to passing insects. The sundew belongs to the genus Drosera, which means ‘dewy’ in Latin, and the famous naturalist, Charles Darwin, proclaimed that sundews were his favourite species, compiling drawings and experiments for his book, Insectivorous Plants, published around 1876.
As you can see in the pictures here, the great sundew boxes well above its weight, and any curious insect, even dragonflies, unfortunate enough to become entrapped has no chance of escape.
The sundew’s tentacles roll up and tighten around its prey, smothering and drowning the insect in the sticky fluid.
Digestive enzymes are then slowly secreted, breaking the insect down into a meal which it then absorbs.
Eventually, the leaf unfurls, revealing an empty insect exoskeleton.
Joshua who obtained his seedlings from a relict population in Cumbria explained: “Every year when it flowers, it produces tens of thousands of tiny seeds that look a bit like dust.
“Planting out 10, might not sound a lot, but the number of seeds they produce, I’m hoping for a healthy number of seedlings next year hopefully numbering hundreds.”
I’ll keep you posted, in the meantime some interesting sundew folk lore:
Sundew was also known as lust-wort, red rot and youth-wort.
Described in early texts variously as, ‘Sheepherds do call it the red rot because it rotteth sheep,’ and ‘This herbe is of a very strange nature and marvellous, for although that the sunne doe shine not, and a long time thereon, yet you shall finde it alwaies moist and bedewed, and the small haires thereof alwaies full of little drops of water, and the hotter the sun shineth upon this herbe, so much the moyster it is.’
Similar stories abound concerning another insect eating plant found in the UK, the Common butterwort.
This plant has a rosette of yellow-green and sticky leaves that appear flat to the ground and are shaped like a star.
It produces around two or three upright flower stalks which bear small, deep purple flowers.
Otherwise known as Bog violet or Marsh violet, it has been considered a magical plant in the Scottish islands.
On the Hebridean island of, Colonsay, it was thought that if you picked Butterwort or sundew on Halloween, it protected you from witches, whilst if your cows had eaten it, they were safe from elf-arrows.
Bogs themselves as habitats, which have taken thousands of years to form from dead vegetation, are dying out across the UK, so please do not buy ‘peat products’ for your gardens, as there are plenty of suitable alternatives.
The bog-lands of Ireland, depleted by 90 per cent in the past 100 years, are very dear to my heart, and Carna Bog, seen here, and the quite remarkable Roundstone Bog, both in the Province of Connemara in County Galway, are well worth a visit.