Carnivorous Basket-like Seed Pods of a Passion Flower

Description:

These strange spiny seed pods like little baskets containing the forming fruit were on a vine that was tangled up with many other plants along the highway. This is a species of Passion Flower that produces sticky, spiny bracts around the fruit as it grows. This has a dual purpose of making the fruit difficult to eat (it is supposed to be delicious) and amazingly these bracts also produce a sticky fluid which traps and dissolves small insects. The plant then uses this protein source as nutrients. This species of Passion Flower is considered PROTOCARNIVOROUS. Note the 3-lobed leaf and the tiny trichomes (hairs) on the stems. See this reference: http://www.bio.utexas.edu/courses/bio406.... Common names for this species include "Stinking Passion Flower" and "Love in a Mist".

Habitat:

Heavy shrubbery along the highway between San Cristobal de Las Casas and Tuxtla Gutierrez, km 11.5, 865 meters.

Notes:

I will go back and find the flower to add to this spotting. Arun has great pictures of the flower, fruit and the whole plant - from India, taken in October of 2012: http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/159....