Leaf litter consumption and diet breadth expansion in the broad-ranged carnivorous plant, Sarracenia purpurea: a preliminary study

Premise: Diet breadth is an important component of life history that impacts range size, evolutionary outcomes, and ecosystem functioning. While studies of diet breadth have traditionally been confined to animals, carnivorous plants provide an exciting conceptual extension to existing theory. Here, we examine the possibility of diet breadth expansion in Sarracenia purpurea, a wide-ranged carnivorous pitcher plant.
Methods: We integrate observational, greenhouse, and manipulative field experiments with nitrogen combustion analysis to quantify the consumption of leaf litter by S. purpurea. 
Results: Our quantification of captured biomass in wild S. purpurea demonstrates that trap leaves collect leaf detritus in situ, and the captured plant biomass is comparable to that of insect prey. S. purpurea pitchers fed leaf biomass in the field exhibited increased foliar nitrogen, while a follow up greenhouse experiment did not support this finding.
Conclusions: S. purpurea pitchers collect a ..., This dataset describes the capture, digestion, and utlization of leaf litter by the carnivorous pitcher plant Sarracenia purpurea. It includes observational data on the incidence of leaf litter within wild S. purpurea pitchers over time, ammonia measurements quantifying the release of nitrogen from leaf litter and insect prey into pitcher fluids, and percent foliar nitrogen and carbon measurments of pitchers experimentally fed leaf litter or insect biomass in both field and greenhouse contexts. It also includes S. purpurea growth metrics (rosette diameter, pitcher number, leaf senescence) and inquiline survivorship data as a response to experimental diet treatments. Fluid ammonia levels were measured using 0-6.0 mg/L Ammonia Test Strips (Hach, Loveland, Colorado, United States), and nitrogen and carbon concentrations were measured using CHN combustion analysis., , # Leaf litter consumption as evidence for diet breadth expansion in the broad-ranged carnivorous plant, Sarracenia purpurea

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.95x69p8tf](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.95x69p8tf)

## Files

Raw data files:

* **Observational_results.csv** -- The sorted/massed prey contents and foliar nitrogen and carbon concentrations (%) in the pitchers sampled during the observational field study.
* **Obs_longitudinal.csv** -- The weekly counts of different pitcher content items captured during the longitudinal observational field study.
* **Vitro_results.csv** -- The diet treatment and fluid ammonia measures for the in vitro model pitchers (small glass vials).
* **Vivo_CHN_duplicates_data.csv** -- The percent foliar nitrogen and carbon of pitcher samples from the in vitro field experiment, measured in duplicate using CHN combustion analysis.
* **Vivo_Metadata.csv** -- The diet treatments and notes for the pitcher plants used in the in vivo field experiment.
* **Greenhouse...,