Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Man-Eating Tree-Man-eating tree can refer to any of various legendary carnivorous plants that are large enough to kill and consume a person or other large animal-no such plant is known to exist, though a variety of unconfirmed reports have been recorded-presently, the carnivorous plant with the largest known traps is probably Nepenthes rajah, which produces pitchers up to 35 cm (14 inches) in height and will sometimes consume small mammals

Umbdhlebi-Umdhlebi is an unverified plant species purported to originate in Zululand, South Africa. It was first reported in the journal Nature on November 2, 1882 by Reverend G. W. Parker, a missionary in South Africa, who said the plant was poisonous.-according to Parker, Zulus sacrificed sheep and goats to the tree to calm the evil spirit -as of July 18, 2007, no specimen of the Umdhlebi has ever been recovered, and other than 19th century anecdotal evidence no further verification is known to exist-the Umdhlebi is described as having large, fragile green leaves, and two layers of bark - a dead outer layer that hung off the tree, and a new living layer that grew beneath it -the fruit of the tree was reported to be red and black, and to hang from branches like small poles