Not Always a Killer

Some pitcher plants gave up hunting for a stranger deal. The giant Nepenthes lowii reshaped its pitcher into a toilet: tree shrews perch on the rim to lick its nectar and leave droppings behind, and the plant feeds on that dung instead of insects. A related species even lets bats roost inside and lives off their waste. For these plants, the richest meal is delivered, not trapped.

The arrangement works because these plants live high on cold Bornean mountains, where insect prey is scarce and trapping rarely pays. By harvesting nitrogen from droppings instead, a single pitcher becomes a small nutrient hub in an otherwise barren highland — a quiet ecosystem engineer that gathers what the thin mountain soil cannot provide.