Dinner Time

There's nothing quite so entertaining as watching a Venus flytrap in a bagful of flies - akin to watching paint dry, in our case.

We have had a sudden invasion of small flies in the house - not the tiny ones from the compost, but proper flies, only small. We can't find the origin but thought the Venus flytrap might like to dispose of them so caught a few, one at a time, in little jam jars and placed them with the plant in a polybag, then sat back and watched for action, satisfied that we were providing a good meal.

Perhaps these flies are not to the plant's taste for, though they walked all over and round the inside edge of the trap, seemingly enjoying a snack, not one fly has (so far) triggered the leaf to snap shut. In fact, right now they seem to be asleep.

However, all is not lost; we have put the remaining jars in the freezer and the plant will be fed deceased flies, in the manner suggested on the website: that is, to trigger the trap then agitate it to simulate a wiggling attempt at escape.

I'll keep you posted; you can't say we don't try.