writing in 1875 that Utricularia and Nepenthes were not "at all related to the Droseraceae". This remained a subject of debate for over a century. In 1960, Leon Croizat concluded that carnivory was monophyletic, and placed all the carnivorous plants together at the base of the angiosperms. Molecular studies over the past 30 years have led to a wide consensus that Darwin was correct, with studies showing that carnivory evolved at least six times in the angiosperms, and that trap designs such as pitcher traps and flypaper traps are analogous rather than homologous. The origin of carnivory within the ancestors of the Droseraceae has been dated to 85.6 million years ago, with the evolution of snap-traps dated to 48 million years ago. Researchers have hypothesized that carnivory in the Droseraceae began with simple flypaper traps, followed by movement of tentacles in some Drosera-like species, followed by movement of leaves, leading eventually to the development of snap-traps in Dionaea and Aldrovanda by increasing the speed of the leaf movements and altering the morphology of the leaves. Due to the sister relationship of Dionaea and Aldrovanda, it is likely that the snap-trap mechanism only evolved once, but it is unknown if the common ancestor was terrestrial or aquatic. Gallery References External links Caryophyllales families