Tag Archives: Addiction

Stickin' out…

Posted on November 4, 2010 | 2 comments

When breeding, I’ve found that one will encounter a lot of genetic variations. Variants in all Shapes. Size. Colors. Shape. Smell. Feel. Maybe taste.

While doing some sorting in the yard, one of the seedlings really stuck out apart from its siblings.  S. catesbaei “Flying Nun” x “Red Blush” (cross by Brooks Garcia) is the cross pictured below, 2 years old from seed. You can see that in the sea of red, one plant is coming up yellowish.  The one in the center and the yellowish one on the upper right hand third of the photo are pitchers of the same seedling.  The rest of the group is red.  Ah genetics… interesting stuff indeed.

 

S. Catesbaei "Flying Nun" x "Red Blush"[Sarracenia catesbaei “Flying Nun” x “Red Blush”]

2 Comments

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

Species

Posted on October 20, 2010 | Leave a comment

Back to basics, shall we?

Sarracenia species.  Below you’ll find the cornerstones of what the hybrids are built upon.  I’ve recently been even more appreciative of the species; probably due to the hybrid madness that’s going on with me right now. I love the complexities, the various breeding combinations, and the whole roll-of-the-dice that you get when breeding plants.  You never know what you’ll get! Patience required, but hybridizing is very awesome indeed.

That said, I’ve been only breeding/hybridizing for the past 2-3 years.  I’m just starting and am only just starting to see some of my work come to fruition.  All of this crossing, combining, creative madness has gotten me to really appreciate the species so much, and to realize the importance of preserving them.

Below are a few photos of the species and a listing of their subspecies/variations.  Keep in mind, that even within species, there is much diversity in color, shape, and size.  The photos below are for illustrative purposes to give you a very general feel/sense of what each of these species is all about.  Taxonomy for the plants are debated in some cases (depending on who you talk or argue with) — but for now, I’ll try to keep it simple… 🙂


[Sarracenia alata: Pale Pitcher Plant]

***


[Sarracenia flava : Yellow pitcher plant]

– Sarracenia flava var. atropurpurea

– Sarracenia flava var. cuprea

-Sarracenia flava var. maxima

– Sarracenia flava var. ornata

-Sarracenia flava var. rubricorpora

-Sarracenia flava var. rugelii

***


[Sarracenia leucophylla: White pitcher plant]

***


[Sarracenia minor : Hooded pitcher plant]

-Sarracenia minor var. okefenokeensis

***


[Sarracenia oreophila : Green pitcher plant]

***


[Sarracenia psittacina : Parrot pitcher plant]

***


[Sarracenia purpurea : Purple pitcher plant]

-Sarracenia purpurea subsp. purpurea

-Sarracenia purpurea subsp. purpurea f. heterophylla

-Sarracenia purpurea subsp. venosa : Southern pitcher plant

-Sarracenia purpurea subsp. venosa var. burkii

-Sarracenia purpurea subsp. venosa var. burkii f. luteola

-Sarracenia purpurea subsp. venosa var. montana

***


[Sarracenia rubra : Sweet pitcher plant]

-Sarracenia rubra subsp. alabamensis : Alabama pitcher plant

-Sarracenia rubra subsp. gulfensis : Gulf coast pitcher plant

-Sarracenia rubra subsp. jonesii

-Sarracenia rubra subsp. wherryi : Red pitcher plant

***

 

Leave a comment

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Livin' on the Edge

Posted on October 18, 2010 | 2 comments


[Sarracenia ‘Alucard’ and future meal, livin’ on the edge…]

I don’t really got to say much here, but man… that fly really is livin’ on the edge (not for long though…)

2 Comments

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Alien!

Posted on October 6, 2010 | Leave a comment

Today a co-worker of mine was telling me about some news story she heard about with a UFO sighting in Mongolia… or somfin’ like that… (I guess the story was like… from today, and news clips could be found on places like this…)

But anyway, the whole UFO/alien thing reminded me of one of the plants growin’ out here that I think showed up after UFO’s invaded my grow area or something.  One of the alien dudes were left behind. So I potted it up… Some lime green weird looking Sarracenia-iod-ish type plant from the planet Triffid. Or something…

Actually, it’s just a Sarracenia flava x psittacina. Heh heh. But still, looks pretty durn funny to me – like it just walked out of a space ship or something. 🙂

flavaxpsit1[Sarracenia flava x psittacina – Take me to your leader!]

flavaxpsit2[Sarracenia flava x psittacina]

Leave a comment

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa var. burkii f. luteola

Posted on September 29, 2010 | 2 comments

Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa var. burkii f. luteola. Yeah. Type that 10 times fast without getting carpal tunnel syndrome!  (S. purpurea ssp venosa var. burkii = S. rosea.  Ah yes, the name game. A comprehensive run down of this is can be found in the FAQ’s of  Barry Rice’s site.)

It’s an awesome plant  and for more information, read about the history of this plant  on the International Carnivorous Plant Society page about this friggin’ awesome plant. (Thanks Mr. Miller and Mr. Hanrahan!)

About a year or so ago, I received a few seeds from fellow grower friend, Chris Gussman.  The seedlings are now showing some luteola-ness!  Chris (Chris, correct me if I am wrong), crossed 2 of his S. rosea f. luteola plants and now the seeds are coming up over here pretty nice.   I have hopes to propagate and distribute these plants (among others)  in the future to ensure this plants survival.  Thanks again Chris!

Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa v. burkii f. luteola[Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa var. burkii f. luteola, 9.18.10]

2 Comments

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

I'm stuffed…

Posted on September 28, 2010 | Leave a comment

Dude, I’m stuffed… I just had this incredible dinner just now – a regular “mixtwo” burrito from Taqueria Guadalajara. (yeah, that’s a yelp link…) I don’t like the sour cream and other “fluff” to get in the way of the flavors of the meat. The two choices of protein in this particular burrito was carne asada (steak) and carnitas (pork).  The flavors play well off each other and enhance each other.  And these burritos were like as big as my forearm, and i figured I would only eat half and work out tonight — BUT — the flavor was so awesome that I just ate the whole thing. YES.  Anyway… now that I got that out of the way, I feel friggin’ stuffed. Like dude… food comatose is setting in but I gotta get this blog post outta the way before I fall asleep on my keyboard. 😉

Just hope I don’t end up like the following photo of a pitcher plant filled with bugs. This pitcher is completely stuffed.  Look closely, you can see the exoskeltons of the meals in there.  Pitcher plants are great at trapping prey; when they get too full, the older pitchers will kinda burn out and dark burn marks will appear, or sometimes the pitcher will just break down like below.  Sometimes, the traps are so good at catching prey they get so loaded and wasted with bugs that the pitcher topple over.   Yummy.  Ok, pass the Pepto Bismol please…

Indigestion

Leave a comment

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , ,

Seasons [Seedling] Shift

Posted on September 27, 2010 | Leave a comment

It is a new season, and it’s becoming obvious in the garden, as well as life.  I couldn’t help but thing about change as I was driving home from the office on this beautiful evening.  I was appreciating some simple things about this change into fall:  taking in the colors of the fall sky at dusk,  rollin’ home down highway 1 with the windows down, breathing that fall air, the feel of the wind on my bald scalp… oh and pumpkin spice lattes now available! YEAH! (well, nix the pumpkin spice. I’m happy with just coffee.)  🙂

Cycles. Seasons. Change. Growth.

Beautiful.

Shifts are necessary in growing Sarracenia as well. When one grows Sarracenia from seed like me — things can and will get crowded *very* fast. Sure, seedlings will grow in the pot – for a while – but the true potential of the seedling won’t be visable until some changes happens and it’s given a little bit of room to grow.

The following photos are of a cross that I did last year of Sarracenia courtii, anthocyanin free clone x “Green Monster”  (Photos here link to the actual parent plants.)  This is S. courtii, anthocyanin free x excellens, anthocyanin free.  Anthocyanin free plants lack pigmentation and are all green. All awesome. More examples from an earlier green post.

[Sarracenia courtii, anthocyanin free x “Green Monster” – cross by Robert Co – It’s crowded! Sho ’nuff!]

In the photo above, the seedlings are growing very fast, however it’s time to sort this out. Time to sort and shift em into a place where they can grow.

Separating Sarracenia courtii x "Green Monster"[Removed from the pot. Time to break em apart.]

Separating Sarracenia courtii x "Green Monster"[Sorting.]

The sorting process is fascinating. You don’t really realize how many seedlings are in there until you break it all apart. The strongest ones are evident, and the rest — well other growers will compost them, but I’d like to give this particular cross one year to see how the plants fare and adjust just due to the rarity of the parentage. I’m hoping for some surprises as some seedlings may look smaller and not as strong as their siblings at this time, but the next year after a little TLC, some could have a spurt and become the winners of the group. It has happened to me with a few earlier crosses.

Separating Sarracenia courtii x "Green Monster"[Strongest seedling out of this batch. Good size and shape, and root system formed.]

Separating Sarracenia courtii x "Green Monster"[Fresh transplants… time for growth. In the coming years, their characters will be revealed.]

Leave a comment

Posted in Blog

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,