Venus Flytrap Champions
recognizing & assisting landowners with Venus Flytrap on their property
WHY WE ARE HERE Help us to defend populations of the amazing Venus Flytrap! |
Surveys of known populations of Venus Flytrap in the Carolinas in 2019 and 2020 documented a continuing decline due to urban/suburban development and a lack of burning where appropriate habitat for this rare, charismatic plant species still exists.
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Venus Flytrap Champions recognizes and assists landowners and land managers in the Carolinas who want to care for populations of this rare carnivorous species. We believe landowners can play a significant role in maintaining and increasing the remaining habitat for
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Venus Flytrap and the other insectivorous and uncommon plant species that grow with it. We are collaborating with the following agencies and nonprofit organizations to create a support network for people managing Venus Flytrap habitat on private property:
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Flytrap License Plate, NC
North Carolinians have a specialty license plate featuring Venus Flytrap, thanks to a bill passed by the NC General Assembly in 2024 and signed into law by then Governor Roy Cooper LEARN MORE |
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Ongoing Efforts to Secure Habitat for Flytraps in Boiling Spring Lakes, NC
“Saturday April 26, 2025, was a banner day for our little dedicated Boiling Spring Lakes Plant Rescue Volunteer Group,” reported Boiling Spring Lakes resident Kathy Sykes. “This marks the eighth effort to save our precious natural treasure of Venus Flytraps from imminent annihilation from that most dangerous wildfire of all—destruction of habitat. . . . It's my understanding that we have now hit the monumental milestone of saving 2,000 plants! That’s quite an undertaking for just a handful of folks!”
Since September of 2022, volunteers from this small town in southeastern North Carolina, plus other folks from farther afield, have worked together to relocate Venus Flytraps found in roadside ditches and other wet habitats where homes and golf courses are rapidly springing up (see above article). The flytraps had migrated to these ditches alongside roads that were built years ago to accommodate planned new housing. Though there was a pause in those development projects due to recognition of the ecological value of those isolated wet habitats, but in September 2023 a U.S. Supreme Court decision changed the definition of “wetlands,” allowing developers to start up the building process once more. On this April Saturday, internationally known Emmy Award-winning director Robert Ford was filming the plant rescue team as they went about their work. The film—a 90-minute documentary—is tentatively titled “Flytrap Town” and will be two years in the making. In no time the group of seasoned volunteers had filled trays to the brim and were ready to move to Phase 2: transplanting to a protected area. Kathy Sykes reflected as she looked back at photos of the day: “Although our uniforms were mismatched our hearts were in unison as we marched to our appointed destination, where the Flytraps would be lovingly planted into a safe place, free from the threat of man-made destruction” in the form of “cheaply built houses and concrete driveways.” The long-term plan is for the relocation site to become an interpretive preserve for not only Venus Flytrap but for other insectivorous plants and the numerous other native species that grow with them. |
March 14, 2025— A story from the Southern Environmental Law Center highlights women, including Julie Moore of Venus Flytrap Champions, who are leading efforts to protect wetland plants and animals. READ.
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