Expert: Christopher Littrell - 5/23/2007

Question
Hello, I am a student from the Nelson Mandela International School in Berlin. I have to research a topic about science and choose to research about the carnivorous island mentioned in the novel,"The Life of Pi". I would like to know,what you think about this topic.Would it be possible for such an island to exist? And if yes, what resources do those plants need to live and build up an island?
your´s sincerely Ceylan Rohrbeck

Answer
Hello Ceylan,

Your topic is interesting, however; the book you indicated would be a fiction, so I am not sure that it would be most useful as an actual science project. Unless you were showing how a variety of actual carnivorous plants evolved some incredible adaptations as a means of showing how fictional accounts are and are not realistic, I am not sure how the book relates.

There are carnivorous plants that grow rather large (vines in Borneo and the Philippines called Nepenthes that grow several meters in length), however, none are capable of capturing or harming humans (as a matter of fact monkeys and orangutans drink liquid from their leaves unharmed). There are second hand accounts of trees that drip toxins from their leaves to kill animals under them, however; those stories from South America have not been confirmed.

I encourage you to look up non-fiction books and online materials to determine for yourself if the fictional account matches what is known about the various carnivorous plants found in the real world.

Look up information about Asian and North American Pitcher Plants, Venus Flytraps, Sundews, and Butterworts for starters.

Good luck on your research.

Christopher