I spent part of the morning in a black spruce bog helping track a buck. I've seen these plants many times, but never taken a picture before. Do any of you folks happen to be familiar with it? The cups usually hold water, and in the warmer months are full of bugs. I wonder if it isn't feeding off the dead bugs. Any info would be appreciated.

Pitcher Plant--traps and eats insects, pretty neat plant common in NY bogs that I trapped, hunted and foraged in.

Thank you Tom. That name sure makes sense.

Those are pitcher plants. One of two carnivorous plants that we have in Minnesota. Coincidentally both reside in our northern bogs. Cool plants. That liquid inside will disintegrate any insect that falls/slips inside of them. A cool adaptation to obtain nutrients in an otherwise fairly sterile soil.

cool,ive never seen anything like that,but im in southern mn.

Pitcher plants usually sell for $20.00 to $50.00 each. If legal in your area, you could dig those, pot them up and sell them for decent money.

We made a lot of money on native plants this year and hope do a lot more next year. I've never had a pitcher plant.

Keith

There's a 500 square mile "Big Bog" between Big Sam and my house. So lots of prime pitcher plant habitat! But there are quite a few bogs farther south that have pitcher plants......maybe around the Brainerd area and north.

Interesting Keith. I'm not positive but I can assume that state land here likely has restrictions on the harvest of live plants for resale without some kind of permit.....and I can also imagine that pitcher plants fall under some sort of threatened species list. But maybe not?

I just looked it up.



I know a lot of people collect carnivorous plants and strange plants. My best seller is Amorphophallus konjac, a very strange plant that has the world's third largest flower.





I would be very careful to accurately identify those pitcher plants before trying to dig or sell them.

Keith

Round leaf sundew appears to be the other common carnivorous plant. I didn't know what it was until now, but I saw a bunch of that today too. There are many plants that I've been seeing for my entire life and can't identify, I intend to change that.

People buy and sell lots of sundews too.

Keith

I've been to northern Mn. Based upon the mosquitoes, I'd say those plants are more likely propagating them than eating them!

It looks like you can probably sell sundews collected in Minnesota, but I would check well before trying to do so.



If legal, your kids might be able to make a decent amount of money selling rare native plants they collect.

Keith

Keith

I'm going to look into that Keith. I certainly know quite a few bogs to harvest in if we can do it legally. Thank you for the idea.

In the right spot, it doesn't take long to dig and pot up a decent amount of money's worth of plants. You just need to be careful of the law.

We did well with native trees, bushes and wildflowers. I have lots of seeds to plant still this Fall. I need to build some more air pruning beds.

Keith

You're welcome Sam. Your kids should be able to put aside some money for college and some fun stuff too, if it's legal in your area. Even if the pitcher plants and sundews are illegal in your area, there should be a lot of plants they can legally do. Etsy is a good place to sell if you want to ship.

Locally to me, even common milkweed, butterfly weed, swamp milkweed, ironweed and wild asters sell well and they are common in many grassy fields.

Keith

there is a mosquito that lives only in the pitcher plant fluid and overwinters as a larvae, so be careful with inter-state trade

You might want to try SEEK. It's a free app you can download on your phone. Open the app and take a few pictures. It will often give you the species. I have learned a lot of plants using it.

Now I have more stuff to research. Thank you sir.