Plants: Three New Nepenthes

This is my first plant post of this blog. Besides reviewing and discussing books, the other goal of this blog is to showcase some of my carnivorous plants and provide information regarding their history, cultivation, and other horticultural information. My parents gave me the following three plants for my birthday. They were imported from Exotica Plants, one of the leading Nepenthes hybrid nurseries, based in Australia. Since importing plants can be expensive, oftentimes members of the carnivorous plant community will combine orders to split the import, shipping, and paperwork costs. Many times, these group orders are organized in online forums, with mixed success. With public "group orders," there is always the potential for something to go wrong. Everyone will get excited when a group order gets announced, everyone wants to get involved, but many people will fall through (for whatever reason). With good fortune, I have met (online) many reliable carnivorous plant enthusiasts, and was fortunate to get involved in a private group order. The following plants were received in this order, and were shipped from Australia, to Los Angeles, to Nebraska, to Kansas City, Missouri.

The three plants I received are all Nepenthes hybrids.

The first plant is a hybrid between N. maxima "dark" and a N. Trusmadiensis. The Trusmadienses is a very unique, naturally occuring hybrid between N. macrophylla and N. lowii. The unique features of this plants can be attributed to the following plants, with links to public access pictures of those plants):

• Splotched coloration: N. maxima;
• Toothed peristome (the lip around the pitcher opening): N. Trusmadiensis (the teeth in that hybrid are faded and come from N. macrophylla); and,
• Upper pitchers: N. lowii - the plant I received does not have upper pitcher yet, but the N. lowii has very dominant traits that always are expressed in upper pitchers that will make huge mouths and very distorted pitchers.

N. maxima "dark" x N. Trusmadiensis:


The next two plants are smaller, seed grown hybrids that will most certainly blossom into stunning beauties!

First, a hybrid between N. ventricosa and N. ephippiata (a close relative to N. lowii, mentioned above):


And second, a hybrid between N. truncata and N. Trusmadiensis:


I hope you enjoy those pictures. I look forward to posting more and many years of growth and beauty!

Good growing,

Plants and Books