Tucked within a 42-acre parcel owned and managed by the City of Boiling Spring Lakes (BSL) is a special property that is home to some of our region’s most unique and endemic plant life. The Venus Flytrap Education Trail, located at 1 Leeds Rd in Boiling Spring Lakes (adjacent to the BSL Community Center and Cougar Country 18-hole disc golf course), is now a refuge for relocated carnivorous plants like sundews, pitcher plants, bladderworts, and flytraps. 

This seasonally-flooded wetland contains longleaf pines, woody shrubs, and an open herbaceous understory sprinkled with little bluestem grass and vibrant wildflowers such as rose pogonia orchid and orange milkwort (aka “swamp cheeto”). It also provides ideal habitat for insect-eating plants adapted to acidic, sandy soils where fire is frequent. Such soils hold few nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus, and that’s why some native plant species supplement their nutrient needs by capturing and digesting insects.

The Venus flytrap is found nowhere else in the world naturally outside a small area within a ninety-mile radius centered around Wilmington, NC. That makes conserving its habitat a uniquely local responsibility: we are the stewards of a species that exists naturally in our own backyard. 

Local conservationists including Julie Moore (retired biologist with the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program and endangered species specialist for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service) and Tyler Gramley (Vice President of the North American Sarracenia Conservancy) have spearheaded efforts to relocate flytraps and other insectivorous plants if located on a property slated for development. Through a partnership with the North Carolina Plant Conservation Program and Venus Flytrap Champions, the city of Boiling Spring Lakes set aside this land to receive displaced flytraps through the volunteer efforts of the BSL Plant Rescue. Contact Venus Flytrap Champions if you have flytraps on your land or have questions.