Asking an important question

Regular readers will know that I'm a huge supporter of the Green Party. Naturally, that means that I am also a vegan. I'll admit to backsliding here and there -- I probably ought to cut back on my consumption of bacon double cheeseburgers for example. However, the way I look at it pickles and catsup are vegetables, right? Baby steps. At any rate, let he/she/xir/it/they who is without sin cast the first stone.

That brings me to today's video on an issue that I, and I assume you as well, have long been concerned about. Namely, can vegans eat carnivorous plants?

From the video we discover that if you're walking down a path and you spot a Venus flytrap that you can pluck and eat it with a clear conscience. However, should you decide to cultivate Venus flytraps for food the act of feeding them bugs would violate veganism. Rats, there goes my dream of retiring to my 1,000-acre Venus flytrap plantation. 

She goes further off the rails, err... I mean she goes further into the discussion of vegan philosophy by discussing the ethics of using Venus flytraps as pest control. I don't know, I'm from Florida and I don't think that even a veritable palisade of Venus flytraps would do much to stop the creepy-crawlies, but who am I to question her wisdom and authority on the topic?

 

Carnivorous bladderworts

The above short documentary on bladderworts, which are common carnivorous plants, is odd to say the least. For some reason it is narrated in a heavily accented English. In fact the accent is so strong that the documentary is subtitles so you can understand what she's saying. However, even the subtitling doesn't help much because the text seems to have been produced by a machine translator like Babblefish, so it verges on being gibberish at points. 

I wonder what the story behind its production was?

As for bladderworts, they're the only carnivorous plants that set their trap mechanically. They pump water out of the chamber that they capture their prey in, which causes its sides to collapse and also pulls back the valve that covers the chamber's opening. Because their trap is set via reverse pressure, when it is disturbed the sides of the chamber pop out -- creating a vacuum that sucks the prey in at remarkable speeds as well as closing the trap's valve.