We’re the only aquarium in the world culturing and exhibiting these two
species of deep-water hydrozoans, both of which are native to the Monterey Bay.
If you accidentally get transformed into a fly, and get caught in a Venus flytrap, here is some valuable advice: Don’t panic.
“If you just sit there and wait, the next morning, the trap will open and you can leave,” says Ranier Hedrich from the University of Würzburg. “It you panic, you induce a deadly cycle of disintegration.”
Hedrich
and others have found that the Venus flytrap can count the number of
times that its victims touch the sensory hairs on its leaves. One touch
does nothing. Two closes the trap. Three primes the trap for digestion.
And five, according to Hedrich’s latest study,
triggers the production of digestive enzymes—and more touches mean more
enzymes. The plant apportions its digestive efforts according to the
struggles of its prey. And the fly, by fighting for its life, tells the
plant to start killing it, and how vigorously to do so.
