Allow Me To Introduce Ladies Vivian and Diane

Providing a small investment to Bust at the Maker Faire last summer was a great idea. The magazine often has cocktails and recipes, plus book reviews, in-depth interviews, and smart articles about pop culture. I think I paid $5, which is perhaps unfair, because I often feel like I learn a lot with each issue. This month I learned about carnivorous plants.

Carnivorous plants, which are found in bogs (and in some cases, the desert) in the wild, have adapted to an environment where the soil does not provide nutrients. These plants have adapted by eating insects (and not raw meat or delicious children, which I once feared). When planted, horticulturists recommend that the plants be potted in peat moss or sphagnum. Some plants, like the Venus Fly Trap, need only a few insects a year. 

I like to boast that I know a lot about gardening. This is, however, not entirely true. I know a lot about planting over 100 tulip, hyacinth, and lily bulbs. I know a lot about dead heading petunias, and I know how to kill beautiful purple and hot pink daisies. I know how to turn on a hose and drench tomato plants, and how to prune bushes and shrubs. I know how to spread much! I do not actually know a lot about gardening.

I may have overstated my prowess when spring began, and I may have convinced myself that I'm a great amateur gardener when I planted marigolds, a tomato plant, and purple daisies. Then I planted lavender (because bees and butterflies love it), and a small pink cactus. I have dropped the daisies and cactus (on separate occasions), but have yet to kill any of my botanicals with finality.

And this is good, because today I bought two carnivorous plants. Let the record show I have never boasted to know much of anything about bug-eating botanicals.

Bust's Megan O. Andersen convinced me easily. Andersen calls her skin a "neon 'all-you-can-eat-buffet' sign for mosquitoes" and says she uses the plants to keep the pests "at bay." I have my own mosquito problem, and tend to attract the biting bugs more than most (and definitely have a bigger problem with bites than my oblivious, unbitten floormates).

Andersen provides information about the main plants, and where they do best (window sills, patios), and how to take care of them. So naturally, I went on the hunt for the plant that, Andersen "enjoy[s] being overlooked in the winter" and feasts on mosquitoes.




It took some work, but today I bought the last Butterwort, or Pinguicula, the Brooklyn Botanical Garden had. I also like that the Butterwort is rosette-shaped (it makes it look like an otherwise very boring plant) and produces beautiful purple flowers.




I was surprised by how small the plant was, so I invested a second plant for my window sill. I bought Sarracenia, which like the sun, "are happiest in sitting water," and catch bugs in their cup-like appendages. I like how pretty they are when they grow larger. I like how they're reddish and regal.

From the plants' labels:

BUTTERWORTS
Pinguicula sp.

Butterworts lure, capture and digest insects by coating their leaves with a sweet-smelling sticky glue. Gnats, mosquitoes, and other small insects get stuck and their bodily fluids are then absorbed by the plant.

PITCHER PLANTS
Sarracenia sp.

Pitcher plants lure and capture insects by producing a sweet nectar which attracts and immobilizes their prey. The hairs on the lip of the pitcher grow down, so the insect slips, falls in the cup, and then is digested.

AWESOME.

I hope the low maintenance and general stigma (asking for these plants has irritated a lot of plant specialists across the city) makes me look like a bad ass botanist.