Nepenthes Rajah - Carnivory

Carnivory

See also: Pitfall traps

Nepenthes rajah is a carnivorous plant of the pitfall trap variety. It is famous for occasionally trapping vertebrates, even small mammals. There exist at least two records of drowned rats found in N. rajah pitchers. The first observation dates from 1862 and was made by Spenser St. John, who accompanied Hugh Low on two ascents of Mount Kinabalu. In 1988, Anthea Phillipps and Anthony Lamb confirmed the plausibility of this record when they managed to observe drowned rats in a large pitcher of N. rajah. In 2011, the discovery of a drowned mountain treeshrew (Tupaia montana) in a N. rajah pitcher was reported.

Nepenthes rajah is also known to occasionally trap other small vertebrates, including frogs, lizards and even birds, although these cases probably involve sick animals, or those seeking shelter or water in the pitcher, and certainly do not represent the norm. Insects, and particularly ants, comprise the majority of prey in both aerial and terrestrial pitchers. Other arthropods, such as centipedes, also fall prey to N. rajah.

Nepenthes rafflesiana is one of the few other Nepenthes species reliably documented as having caught mammalian prey in its natural habitat. In Brunei, frogs, geckos and skinks have been found in the pitchers of this species. The remains of mice have also been reported. On September 29, 2006, at the Jardin botanique de Lyon in France, a cultivated N. truncata was photographed containing the decomposing corpse of a mouse.