Venus Flytrap

The first Ray book I can recall reading was Aro Ek Dojon (Yet Another Dozen). It started with the spine-chilling Septopuser Khide, which was followed by the even more intimidating Fritz, and later in the book, Khogom. Thought the sharp end of Fritz gave me the maximum goosebumps Khogom was the most macabre, Septopuser Khide was definitely the one that got stuck into my memory the most.

When I grew up I Googled the word septopus, and (as expected) didn't find a relevant result (though I came up with cartoons of octopi with a missing limb). However, the other plants mentioned in the book were possibly real, I thought. So I tried Nepenthes.

It was real.

And then, while browsing through its Wikipedia page, I came across the curiously named Venus flytrap.

It goes by the name Dionaea muscipula, and is found in the Carolinas (no, I wasn't privileged with a glimpse in my five trips) in locations with a low nitrogen content in the air.

But what I found most intriguing was the name. It's decent-looking, but Venus? Was it that attractive? That sensuous? I wonder...

More importantly, it was capable to consume decent-sized insects, even large spiders, so why name it after one of the smaller insects it manages to trap? Mind you, the very small creatures are allowed to escape through the pores, since the effort spent in digestion is not worth the prey. Then why a flytrap?

Then it struck me. Fly isn't necessarily a noun here - it's a verb. It stops the flight of unsuspecting creatures and captivates them into a reduced lifetime of misery. They poor creature doesn't have an option but to face death approach as a sluggish, ruthless, unavoidable demise. It tries its best to escape, but there's no way out - it just faces its end, just like that. I suppose it lets out ultrasonic shrieks that don't escape the walls of its prison - shrieks in vain - shrieks that drown into anonymity after choking existence...