Reply With Quotelooks like a dielsiana to me , mines is about to flower as well and seeing that cpi fo your flower i can't wait for mines to .
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Hi,
I grew this plant from seeds labeled Drosera dielsiana. As i have received lots of most probably wrong labeled seeds of this species, i am very interested in your oppinions. I think, it is a dielsiana.
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I am especially interested in the flowers of this species. Are there forms of Drosera dielsiana, with styles whose apexes are more thentwo times divided ?
Christian
looks like a dielsiana to me , mines is about to flower as well and seeing that cpi fo your flower i can't wait for mines to .
It is a classic D. dielsiana, at least by my standards!
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The flower on that is just beutiful! It reminds me of my tdb water lilies.
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it seems that my dielsiana has a very oval leaf and a short "stem" that leads to the base of the plant. Flowers look same
Taproot, Anti-Flag, The Casualties, Alkaline Trio, Eleventeen, Deadsy, AFI...what's not to love?
I agree with cephalotus88, my dielsiana have a trianglar or diamond shape leaf with short stem. My search on the web also show the dielsiana to have the same shape as mine.
I hate to dispute Tamlin, but are you sure this plant is a dielsiana?
Yes, I am as sure as it is possible to be sure. *Read the pinned post on South African Drosera on the sundew forum * *to get an idea of the confusion regarding the South African species of similar karyotype.
You need to keep an open mind when it comes to these plants: the fact that your plant looks different does not mean that it too is not D. dielsiana. *There is no "typical" D. dielsiana, even the holotype is but one member of a vastly variable species and can never reflect the wide variability to be found in this third largest species in S.A.
Growers tend to typify their own plants, and favor the appearance these individuals express. Seeking consensus on the internet is likewise optimistic. I am sure if you look a bit more, you will also find examples of plants of this species that don't look like yours, but these are rejected since they don't look like your plants.
I currently grow about 6 different forms of this species: everything from rosettes the size of a nickel to rosettes the size of a silver dollar: lamina round, sub-rotund to nearly spatulate. Flowers dark pink, light pink with a dark base, light pink. Pigment deep red to nearly green in the same light. Styles simply divided from the base, spoon shaped at the apex, or with further additional bifurcation.
Determination of D. dielsiana often devolves to what the plant is not, rather than what it is. As it lacks a tetrete petiole (round in x section) it cannot be D. burkeana. Without greater bifurcation of the styles it can't be either D. aliciae or D. natalensis. The other rosetted tropicals like D. cuneifolia, trinervia, etc all have very distinctive lamina....so what does this leave?
Don't look for "genetic purity" in the South Africans, you won't find it.
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Christian,
If a plant species can hybridize with another plant species in the same geographical locality and form fertile hybrids, and there are no geographical barriers to isolate them, then there will always be intermediate forms between the two species.
In the case of D. dielsiana, D. natalensis, D. aliciae, D. cuneifolia, D. nidiformis, D. burkeana, D. madagascariensis, D. capensis and other members of the South African Drosera this is exactly the case.
The continental migration of Africa to the North has resulted in a concentration of these species in the Cape area in South Africa.
In such a scenario, the term species is a verb, not a noun. At one time, members of the D. natalensis complex may have become stable through geographic isolation, allowing populations to become stable and uniform enough to warrant species seggregation as is the case with the genus Sarracenia. If the sarraceniae had all been forced into the same range millions of years ago, do you think we would be able to now find pure representatives? It is the geographic isolation that is essential.
With the passing of time isolated populations can evolve (speciate) to the point where they are no longer capable of backcrossing with their original parents. This can result from changes in flower structure, specific pollinators, a difference in flowering times. In my opinion, these members should then be considered as distinct species. Such is not the case with some of the South African Drosera, at least not now in Southeast Africa.
South Africa is a "melting pot" and has been so for millions of years. Even the species we regard as "true" species may in fact be hybrids which became more successful than their parents and won the niche once occupied by them in the distant past.
The majority of the individuals in South Africa may be placed into the distinct taxa as stated above, but there are always going to be intermediate stations where the ranges overlap.
D. dielsiana may actually be an intermediate that arose where the range of D. burkeana and D. natalensis overlapped. As such, the plant carries the genetic expressions of both of these populations, and the phenotypical expression of individual members of this species will express these traits.
Where D. dielsiana currently overlaps the range of other of the South African Drosera, the process of forming hybridogenic intermediaries is continuing, producing new variations, many of which authors have tried to publish as species novae.
Keeping all this in mind, how then can one begin to seek a purely representative form? Even the holotype is one member selected from a vast range of many differently appearing plants and cannot reflect the range of this variation. It is for this reason I have been cautioned not to place any ultimate reliance on taxanomic keys (e.g. Obermeyer)
In the field, the most reliable determinator for D. dielsiana is seed morphometrics. Seed of D. dielsiana is oval, and much shorter than seed of D. natalensis or D. aliciae (which are identical). Shorter seed is more likely to be hybridogenic in origin, but be aware that under cultivation seed length varies wildly, and hence is not a reliable determinator!
However, there is no single characteristic mentioned in the keys that is more completely significant than any other, and very few plants actually conform in all regards to the published descriptions, even when observed in habitat, and certainly not under cultivation!
In cultivation, the identification of individuals seggregated from their populations will always be a matter of personal opinion. There is no expert that can answer those questions.
For these reasons, I feel an open mind is the best plan, along with the free usage of "aff." (affiliated with) where there is some question of possible introgression, as in Drosera aff. dielsiana, as with the other South African taxa sharing identical karyotypes, contiguous stations, and possible hybridogenic orgins (even if regarded currently as "true" species).
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