I got interested in the notion of carnivorous plants earlier this summer, but had a very stern meeting with myself wherein I said that I was not going to make my life more difficult by growing subtropical plants in the tundra. Then I found out that carnivorous plants are native to all regions of the US, including the pine bogs of New Jersey. And then I ran across a "Terrarium of Terror" at a local nursery. For $15*, I became the proud owner of a venus flytrap, a cobra plant, and a sundew.

I figured I'd inadvertantly kill them and that'd be the end of it, but instead they're thriving. New leaves all around, baby sundews everywhere. The reading I've done indicates that I should be able to winter them over in my plant window. Since it doesn't look like they're going to die anytime soon and they're due to go dormant in a couple of months, it became apparent that I was going to have to feed them. I'd already fed the sundew chocolate, which you actually can do, but that wasn't going to work for the flytrap. Everything I'd read said that hamburger would not work and would in fact kill them, because a Cow is Not an Insect**. Fair enough.

I'm one of those people who hates hates hates bugs, so shoving a wriggling critter into the traps was out of the question. It would require getting too close to a live bug. The Savage Garden says you can feed them dried bugs from the herpetology section of a pet store, so I figured that was my best bet. I took myself to PetsMart and procured the most unobjectionable bug food source I could find: the Can O'Pillars:

ZooMed Can O'Pillars are soft bodied caterpillars cooked in the can (called “retorting”) which locks in the flavor and freshness while also softening the exoskeleton for easier digestion.

Actually, it was fun for our whole family, with both of us hovering around to watch the flytrap snap shut and then checking to see if it sealed. I'm not sure what this says about us, but it can't mean we're normal. Neither can the fact that it's over in the window digesting away and I'm over here writing about it.

*Heh. Plus pot to repot them in, plus spaghnum moss, plus distilled water, plus The Savage Garden by Peter D'amato (linked above), which you really should buy if you decide you want to grow carnivores. It tells you everything.
**And you know, who can argue with that sort of logic?