Weird and wonderful members of the plant kingdom - strangler plants

Even stranger than meat eating plants is a plant that strangles. What does it strangle? The strangler fig strangles another tree. The strangler fig is a primary hemiepiphyte - the plant is epiphytic (does not rooting in soil during its first stage in life) but becomes rooted in soil later. The strangler tree grows in the topical rainforest. Birds and bats drop seeds and the plant begins to grow high up in the branches of a rainforest tree. Its roots snake downward, wrapping around the trunk of the host tree eventually strangling it.

Ficus seeds will germinate in the branches of a tree. It will them make roots (adventitious roots, that grow down the trunk. Once the roots reach the ground, they grow into the soil. The roots get larger in diameter each year and will eventually completely surround the tree. Thus, the fig eventually strangles the tree. It could do the same to you - if you stayed in one place and did not move for a couple of decades! The beautiful resort town of Cabo San Lucas in Baja California, has an unusual use for palm trunks enveloped by the snakelike roots of strangler figs. They are used as structural supports for palm-thatched palapas and as decorative pillars in plush hotels. In one deluxe condominium the palm trunks and strangler figs were beautifully finished with a high gloss varnish. They were undoubtedly imported from tropical Mexico, grim evidence of man's destructive effect on the tropical rain forest.

In spite of their sinister common name, strangler figs are one of the most important components of tropical forest ecosystems. During the day hundreds of animals feed on the sweet fruits, including many species of pigeons, parrots, hornbills, toucans and monkeys. As night falls, the day foraging shift retires and flocks of fruit-eating bats descend upon the branches. Fig trees typically produce three or more crops of fruit a year, providing food throughout the year when other sources are in short supply. The fleshy, juicy fruits are full of small seeds which readily pass through the digestive tract of animals. In fact, the purgative effect of fig fruits on the bowels encourages its seeds to be widely dispersed--good strategy for an epiphytic opportunist. In addition to the prodigious fruit source, hundreds of animal species make their homes in the hollow trunk where the strangler fig has enveloped the decayed host tree. The cavities provide housing for myriad creatures, including geckos, frogs, lizards, bees, wasps, beetles and ants. These trunk-dwellers in turn provide an additional food source for higher levels of the fig food web.

Vine photograph by randysonofrobert, used under a creative commons attribution licence