Welcome to Girl Scout Troop 124's Virtual Nature Trail!
The trail features: Carnivorous Plants (13 species), Wild Orchids (2 species), Endangered Species (2 species), Wild Iris (1 species)
Nature Trail News: June 1999
The nature trails are under water again, but the water level is dropping. The Venus' Flytraps are in bloom. The sundews are also in bloom. Butterworts have been discovered on the endangered species trail.
Pink Sundew: Drosera capillaris Drosera intermedia with hatpins, Butterwort in Bloom
Click on images to make them larger.
Dwarf Iris: Iris verna, Venus' Flytraps, Pitcher Plant with Bloom
Sarracenia purpurea having a spider for lunch; Watch out for the Stinging Nettle!
Bolivia, N.C. is Venus' Flytrap capital of the world. These rare and beautiful plants are found growing naturally only within a fifty mile radius of Bolivia. The girls in troop 124 are lucky to be able to study Venus' Flytraps and other carnivorous plants in their natural habitat.
Tina's Cadette Silver Award Project involved developing nature trails at a Girl Scout camp so that everyone would be able to see the carnivorous plants without stepping on them.
Dionaea muscipula: Venus' Flytrap Flytraps in bloom Flytrap blooms
The Venus' Flytrap grows low to the ground and can be difficult to find in overgrown areas. The best time to look for flytraps is in May and June when they are in bloom. During the winter, flytraps may become dormant if exposed to low temperatures for a prolonged period of time. Most large, healthy plants do not become dormant in this area. The traps will die when temperatures go below freezing, but new ones start to grow right away. Flytraps may also become dormant during an unusually dry summer.
Flytraps growing through moss. Traps close-up.
Hooded Pitcher Plants:Sarracenia minor
Trumpets:Sarracenia flava
Pitcher plants are easier to find because they grow much taller than Venus' flytraps, but pitchers are always dormant during the winter. The orange flower is an orange milkwort (Polygala lutea). Tree frogs can often be seen hiding in Pitchers waiting for insects. Sometimes they meet with an untimely demise when they slide in and can't get back out.
Purple Pitcher Plant:Sarracenia purpurea and Purple Pitcher plant with Parrot Pitchers: Sarracenia psittacina
Sweet Pitcher Plant: Sarracenia rubra
Sweet Pitchers are smaller than trumpets and not as easy to see.
Southern Pitcher Plant:Sarracenia purpurea venosa
The Southern Pitcher is a subspecies of the Purple Pitcher(a.k.a. Northern Pitcher) which is more common further north.
Southern Pitcher Plants in bloom.
Violet Butterwort: Pinguicula caerulea Violet Butterwort Blooms
Butterworts are extremely difficult to find when their not in bloom. Their leaves are almost flat against the ground. Butterwort leaves are sticky. Insects are that get stuck are digested by the plant.
Though commonly called violet butterworts, caerulea means dark blue. It refers to the innermost whorl of petals on the flower. The color of the petals actually varies from white to deep violet.
Sundews: Drosera brevifolia, Drosera capillaris or rotundifolia?, Drosera intermedia, Drosera brevifolia
The short- leaved sundew, sticky droplets secreted by the plant cling to its leaf hairs and have the appearance of dew.
We think this is the round leaved sundew; it may be D. capillaris, the hairy sundew.
Drosera intermedia is very similar to rotundifolia, but is larger and doesn't lie flat against the ground.
I found this short leaved sundew growing in my front yard.
Horned Bladderworts: Utricularia cornuta
Tiny insects are sucked into the subterranean leaves of the bladderwort.
Cleistes divaricata: Rosebud Orchid, Pogonia ophioglossoides: Rose- Crested Orchid
These two plants are wild orchids. They are not carnivorous but we like them anyway.
All photos taken by Jean Heustess, Christina Hughes, and Debra Hughes at Camp Pretty Pond in Boiling Spring Lakes, N.C. except the Hooded Pitcher Plants. The hooded pitchers are located at a site that has been decimated by poachers on several occasions so I won't disclose their location. If you are going to look for carnivorous plants in the wild, take a camera and leave the shovel at home. Venus' Flytrap and all Sarracenia species are protected under state law in North Carolina. Be sure to look up once in a while, there are other things to see besides plants!
Bald Eagle: Haliaeetus leucocephalus
Red- Cockaded Woodpecker: Picoides borealis
Click here to see photos taken at the North Carolina Botanical Garden. The pitcher plants were all in bloom.
See the Tropical Pitcher Plants in the Butterfly House at the Museum of Life & Science in Durham
Click here for more info about any of the plants pictured on this page.
Visit our Carnivorous Plant Nightmare Page if you dare!
Index
Home
Questions, answers, solutions,
problems?
Visitors since April 7, 1999
Recommended Reading: Click on a book cover for more info or to purchase from Amazon.com.
Niering, Wiliam A. & Nancy C. Olmstead. The Audubon Society
Field Guide to North American Wildflowers: Eastern Region. Chanticleer Press:
New York, 1979.
Western Region
Peterson, Roger Tory. A Field Guide to the Birds of Eastern and
Central North America. Houghton Mifflin Co.:Boston, 1980. Click on the book cover to purchase from Amazon.com.
Western Birds
Pietropaolo, James & Patricia. Carnivorous Plants of the World. Timber Press: Portland, 1986.
Gentle, Victor. Bladderworts: Trapdoors to Oblivion.
Gentle, Victor. Butterworts: Greasy Cups of Death.
This page was last revised on 6/13/99. It will be updated as more photos become available.