NFIB

Feed Me
01/ 29/ 2004

by Kathleen Landis

Gardeners cringe when bugs appear, but not Peter D’Amato. Bugs are assets to a guy who raises and sells plants of prey. As co-owner of his own little shop of horrors (www.californiacarnivores.com), D’Amato’s California Carnivores is a nursery that specializes in carnivorous plants. His passion for the hungry flora began at age 11 when he found a bug-eating plant in a southern New Jersey bog. Nearly four decades later, the Sebastopol, Calif., business owner is still excited about his product.

Who buys these stunning, bizarre flowering plants? "People with taste who enjoy unusual things," D’Amato says. "We have 8-year-old kids who go bonkers over Venus Flytraps, and little old ladies who love pitcher plants." Observers are wowed by the adaptive mechanisms the plants use to snag prey, D’Amato says. Take the Venus Flytrap. Its nectar lures the unwary to a trigger-hair-filled trap that snaps shut in under a second. The Sundew envelops victims in tentacle-covered leaves, then feasts. In the nursery, the voracious plants gobble bees, flies, fungus gnats and other catches. When bugs dwindle, D’Amato encourages customers to BYOB -- Bring Your Own Bugs -- to feed the stock. The nursery supplies forceps for feeding, and magnifying glasses for scrutiny. Are insects the only things his plants ingest? "A lot of these plants will also eat chocolate and cheese," he says. "But we don’t recommend that."

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This article originally appeared in the February/March 2004 issue of MyBusiness magazine.

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