Man eating trees DO NOT exist. Although, that didn't stop some "naturalists" from out and out fabricating stories about them that were reported as fact and people did believe them. Take the above image, for example, which is the most famous killer tree illustration, from J.W. Buel's Land and Sea 1887, called the Ya-te-veo (or I see you tree), which is supposed to grow in Central America, and it seen devouring a native tribal member. It is widely believed that Buel was inspired by the most circulated account of such a thing actually eating someone. In 1881 a so-called "German explorer" whose very name turned out to be a fabrication--one "Carl Liche" reported that he had seen a tree on the island of Madagascar devour a member of a Malagasy tribe called Mkodo. It took until the 1950's to prove once and for all time that the entire story, including the tribe were made up. Of course that doesn't stop all kinds of carnivorous trees from populating works of literature; in reality, there not really many real trees that can consume live prey. It is known that white pines, for example, have the ability to consume small insects, ONLY when a certain type of fungus is growing on it, which works with the tree in a symbiotic relationship to digest insects--most of the nutrients going to shroom. There is a Wikipedia entry on so-called "Man Eating Tree."
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| This looks like it could eat you--but it can't. |
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