1. Abstract
The Venus flytrap is a small carnivorous plant possessing
bilobed leaves in which it
Captures its prey. The closing of these leaves around a
suitably-sized nitrogen containing object takes place in two
distinct phases, one in which the lobes slowly squeeze together
to facilitate digestion. It is believed that the Phase 1 reaction is
brought about by changes in turgor pressure after a trigger
hair in the leaf is stimulated, but that the Phase 11 reaction is
an actual growth response. This experiment was designed to
teat the hypothesis that treating the Venus flytrap with
gibberellic acid, a growth hormone, would increase the speed
of the Phase 1 reaction. Ten Venus flytraps were watered with
1 ppm gibberellic acid solution, while ten plants were watered
with distilled water every other day for ten days; at the end of
this time, the speed of both closing reactions was tested using
five leaves from each plant. Though the mean time of both
phases was shorted in the experimental group, the results of
the t-tests showed that only the data from Phase 11 were
significant at the 0.05 level of significance. The research
hypothesis that the Phase 11 closing speed of the Venus flytrap
would be increased by the application of glbberellic acid was
therefore supported.