The recent incident of a plant eating a bird in the UK is only the second in history. The first was celebrated a few years ago in Germany
An unusual picture was discovered a few days ago by a resident of the English village of West Pennard, Nigel Hewitt-Cooper, when he was examining his tropical garden. In one of the jugs of the plant of the genus Nepenthes, feathers of the unfortunate bird were visible.
"The largest of these plants often feed on frogs, lizards and mice, and the largest of these jugs has been found with rats inside, but finding a bird in such a plant is unusual," says Nigel.
He believes that the great tit sat on the edge of the jug, attracted by insects. She bent down to get some bug floating in the throat of a predatory plant, but fell down and could not get out.
Both cases of poultry getting into the pitcher plant occurred in cultivated gardens. In the wild, biologists have not yet noted such incidents. Nevertheless, the repetition of a very unlikely, as it seems, situation suggests that similar cases are quite possible in the jungle.