Darwin Was Right: Alpine Flower Is Actually Carnivorous

More than 150 years after Charles Darwin first suspected certain alpine flowers were secretly meat-eaters, scientists have finally proven him right.

Researchers studying Saxifraga candelabrum, a flower growing high in China's Hengduan Mountains, discovered the plant does exactly what Darwin hypothesized back in the 1800s. It attracts, captures, and digests insects using sticky hairs on its stems.

Darwin spent years studying these plants but couldn't prove his theory before his death. Now, a team of botanists has picked up where he left off, publishing their findings in Nature Communications this August.

"To have the opportunity to confirm a prediction of Darwin is both humbling and very exciting," says study co-author Doug Soltis, a botanist at the University of Florida.

The research team found mature plants with an average of 71 insects stuck to their sticky hairs. They discovered the flowers use scent to lure prey, blocking odor with glass containers and vision with mesh to test how the plants attracted victims.

Here's the clever part: the plant only traps tiny insects while keeping its pollinators safe. Large helpful insects rarely get caught, ensuring the flower can still reproduce while supplementing its diet with smaller bugs.

Chemical analysis revealed the plant uses phosphatase, an enzyme common in other carnivorous plants, to digest its meals. When researchers fed the plants fruit flies labeled with nitrogen isotopes, the nitrogen levels rose in the Saxifraga but not in control plants, proving it absorbs nutrients from its prey.

Genetic testing showed the flower shares DNA with other known carnivorous plants, adding another layer of proof.

Why This Inspires

This discovery opens doors to understanding how many more plants might be carnivorous than we ever realized. Soltis suspects other members of the Saxifraga family, which also have sticky hairs, might share this hidden talent.

Susan Myers of the Pittsburgh Botanic Garden, who wasn't involved in the study, says the research reminds us how much we still don't know about the plant world. "We are still barely scratching the surface of botanical knowledge," she notes.

Darwin's curiosity about the natural world continues to guide scientific discovery more than a century after his death, proving that great questions never expire.