Darwin, Acupuncture, Nerves and Flytraps

Haha .. at last, a possible correlation between 2 of my interests - CPs and medicine! Took this interesting morsel of information from this month's issue of CPN (Vol. 33/3). Charles Darwin sent a letter to Asa Gray dated 22 Oct 1872 which described how he used acupuncture on venus flytraps:

"The point which has interested me most is tracing the nerves which follow the vascular bundles. By a prick with a sharp lancet at a certain point, I can paralyse one half the leaf, so that a stimulus to the other half causes no movement."

Now that my Sarracenia are all coming out of dormancy, there's life again in the garden! Took a look at the ICPS seedbank, and it's really heartening to see increasing numbers of CITES-protected species listed for distribution. This month there are 3 - Pinguicula ionantha, Sarracenia oreophila and S.rubra ssp. alabamensis. What I don't understand is, these 3 species are really not spectacular at all! Wonder why they were over-collected in the first place. Very excited. Just sent out a request for some Drosera seeds to the seedbank, maybe they'll arrive just in time for my holidays! They have 2 seedlists available - one for general use by members, and we pay US$1 per packet, and another special list for donators who get a 3-to-1 exchange rate. And I love that donator's list, it has lovely cultivars. My unique D.filiformis ssp. filiformis "Florida red" was grown from seeds from that list. No seeds to donate this quarter though ... my plants aren't producing much.

Taking a short break off from work today; I've completely forgotten that it's MAF tonight. Shall have to mug my writeups again later though. Hasn't been a bad day at all, I pulled through the morning tutorial and afternoon presentation with no mishaps! Saw another mitral stenosis case during tutorial this morning, and it was pretty good.