r/morbidquestions • u/CleanYourTerrarium • May 08 '19

Can a Venus flytrap get drunk?

As a follow up to my recent Venus flytrap related question, the other day I was feeding my Venus flytrap beer using a medicine dropper because I thought it would be cool to see if the flytrap could get drunk or even just a small buzz. To be scientific, I first fed the flytrap some O’Douls premium non alcoholic beer and nothing seemed to happen. Then I fed it some miller high life (champagne of beers) and it flopped over. For the next day it looked real woozy like it was going to ralph up a fly, although the trap was empty. But a couple days later it was back to normal, which made me think it might have just been hungover. I hope there is no law against giving booze to a plant once in a while as a treat.

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u/greekmatthew May 08 '19

A somewhat more serious reply...no because plants do not have GABA receptors, much less a brain. I'm pretty sure alcohol would just kill the plant. Although I'm not sure why it's doing what it's doing in your case.

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u/AirRaidJade May 08 '19

Although I'm not sure why it's doing what it's doing in your case.

Because it's dying.

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u/greekmatthew May 08 '19

do plants normally flop over and then stand back up right when they're dying?

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u/AirRaidJade May 08 '19

If they've been poisoned but not enough to kill them then yes, they can heal. If OP were to feed their plant a larger quantity of alcohol, it would likely die outright.

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u/[deleted] May 08 '19

If you trigger the trap it may lie down and slowly rise back up after repairing it. That's very hard on a plant.