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Outside nepenthes database

I'm interested on what species or hybrids of Nepenthes are grown outside in a variety of climates by other growers. Any further climatic descprition would be helpful to others also as these conditions are not the same for everyone.
I have noticed in the plants that I have acclimatised that it has taken at least 1 year of adapting, growing a new leaf every two months. Adequate pitcher development occurred after at least one year of growing outside in all seasons. It would be interesting to know which species or hybrids will grow and pitcher in other parts of the world.

Please display in this format:

Species or Hybrid, Duration, State, Country, Sex
(and supply photo if available)


Here is my contribution

Khasiana, 5 years, Vic, Aus, Female
Khasiana, 5 months, Vic, Aus, Male
Rokko, 3 years, Vic, Aus, Female
Maxima x ventricosa, 4 years, Vic, Aus, Male
Alata (typical), 5 months, Vic, Aus, Unknown
Ventricosa, 6 months, Vic, Aus, Female


thanks,
C
 
Christian,

As you know I have Triffid Park's form of N. sanguinea outside now for about 5 months.

So.....

N. sanguinea - 5 months - Victoria (Melbourne) - Australia - sex unknown.

Did great through the tail end of Summer and Spring, adding several leaves and pitchers, but has slowed down now with the colder weather (nightly lows to under 5C and days rarely getting over 15C). That's to be expected and other than very little growth and a few chew marks (slugs i figure) it looks just fine.

OutsideSanguinea23.jpg


AJ

Edit: Christian and others, here are Melbourne's seasonal mean temp min/max and rainfall. It'll give y'all an idea of how our climate (especially Winter!!!) is not ideally suited to growing Neps outside, and how any that do successfully grow have proven to be very hardy.

mel_rt.gif


Rainfall (mm) on the left. Temp (Degreec C) on the right.

And, average humidity you can see is on the low side at the best of times:

January 47%
February 49%
March 50%
April 55%
May 61%
June 65%
July 63%
August 58%
September 54%
October 52%
November 51%
December 49%
 
Aaron,

Good stuff! That just proves, that given the proper soil conditions, and light requirements, some nepenthes can tolerate and grow well. The pitchers look WELL formed with no signs of deformation. Leaves also look exceptionally healthy! In person, the colorations looks rich with a spotted red interior.

I'm very interested in seeing how Hamish's highland truncata fairs in the Melbourne weather as the leaves are very healthy and tough!
 
Mad about cps,

My list is on my species / photo page of all my plants I grow outdoors yearround. Feel free to use any of my experience growing them outdoors you feel like. The list is fairly long. Love the outdoor subject thread!!

Joel
Nepenthes Around the House
 
Hello Christian! This is an interesting topic, since we all have different conditions.

I am in San Juan, Puerto Rico (the Caribbean Sea) USA. My plants are grown year-round outside  (in a green-house that only has a top, no walls, and this greenhouse is under a huge Flamboyant tree [Delonix regia]).

The weather in our Island, as most of you know, is a tropical one in the coast and sub-tropical in the mountains. We have heavy rain most of the year, except on our dry season (February to April), the humidity here is always above 75%. Temperatures here in coastal San Juan, at almost sea level, are from 80’s to 90’s in summer, 70’s to 80’s in fall and spring, and in winter from 60’s to 70’s and some times we can have 50’s (all Fahrenheit).

With these conditions my plants adapt very well, some plants take a couple of weeks, others 1 month. But, untill now the only plants that have taken more time have been N. rafflesiana ‘Gigantea’ and N.  truncata. Both plants have been here for the last 6 months and still seem to be adapting and having a low growth rate.

I will post bellow some pics of some of my plants and the information you are requesting. Sorry that the pics are not that clear, but my cell phone camera is not that good;0)

N. X Judith Finn – 6 months – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESXJUDITHFINN.jpg


N. ventricosa – 2 years – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESVENTRICOSABIG1.jpg


N. bicalcarata ‘Red Flush’ – 2 years – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESBICALCARATAPLANT.jpg


N. ampullaria ‘Green’ – 4 months – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESAMPURALIAGREEN.jpg


N. gracilis– 4 months – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESGRACILIS.jpg


N. rafflesiana ‘typical’– 2 years – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESRAFFLESIANATYPICALPLANT.jpg



N. sanguinea– 2 years – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESSANGUINEA.jpg


N.sibuyanensis– 6 months – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESSUBUYANENSIS.jpg


N. x Dominii– 2.5 years – (San Juan) PR – USA – Unknown.
NEPENTHESXDOMINII.jpg


Cheers,
Jorge Joel…
Emilia’s Garden
 
Well All my Neps (highland and lowland) are outside in NE Florida (Just south of Jacksonville).  Since Febuary they have been actually outside and before then have been outside for as long as I have them here's what I remember but that's not all: (all unknown sex exect one)
N. gracilis 'Dusky'
N. bicalcurata
N. 'holland Hybrid'
N. rafflesiana
N. alata
N. alata 'highland stripped'
N. madigascarensis
N. lowii
N. vieillaridi (unknown for sure)
N. ventracosa 'red' (3?)
N. ventracosa (male)
N. maxima 'JD hybrid'
N. miranda
etc.
 
Jorge what a camera and a phone you have! Wow!
Nidce pics for a climate we share. I have a very similar climate here in Hawaii and plants do adapt well, like yours do. I do find the lowlanders take a lot longer to adjust to the Hawaii climate. While intermediates and highlanders grow faster and do somewhat better for me. N. ventricosa grows very fast, the hybrids with N. lowii grows quickly (while N. lowii itself is somewhat slow...for everyone I'm sure), and things like copelandii, sibuyanensis and maximas growing bigger and better without pause.

Bicalcaratas tend to go to sleep and then all of a sudden blossom out with three new leaves and many pitchers everywhere! same with N. ampullaria, where I could sit on them with very little growth, then all of a sudden pitchers everywhere!

michael
 
Even though I've already chatted a fair bit about this with MadAboutCPs, I thought I'd add my two cents worth.

When I first started growing Neps back in the 1980s, I grew them all in terraria. It wasn't until I encountered Joel's site that I began growing them outdoors in the late 1990s.

For about 5 years I grew about half of my collection outdoors, with the other half being housed in friend's greenhouses as the specimens were too valuable to mess around with.

For many years, many of the intermediate and highland species grew very well. They'd grew really well in spring and autumn when days were warm but not too hot, and nights were still cool. In summer, most of them would still grow well, but some of the species that grew in higher altitudes, like aristo and lamii would start throwing out deformed pitchers, or the growing tips would die back.

In winter not much action would happen at all as days were too short and temps too low.

However, the last few years many species started to go backwards as we experienced several seasons of drier weather, and warmer temperatures. Some that had been growing really well started putting out smaller growth and pitchers, or stopped pitchering. I decided to bite the bullet and I built a greenhouse. Since putting the plants in the greenhouse, the improvement in some of them has been miraculous, especially more temperamental species like hamata, tentaculata, lowii and aristo.

I also had an opportunity last year to visit a friend I'd been swapping plants with for a few years. I was shocked to see the difference between the plants I'd given him and their identical twins I'd kept. Some of his were 4 or 5 times the size. I realised that whilst some species will reach almost their full potential outdoors, many will grow fairly averagely, and some will constantly struggle. Of course, it depends on your climate and its consistency.

I still grow some easy species outdoors will excellent results: ventricosa, maxima, sanguinea, spathulata, ramispina and alata. However, their counterparts in the greenhouse produce bigger pitchers, and pitcher more frequently.

Hamish
 
Hamish,

I agree that my plants aren't the size of other Neps grown in greenhouse conditions. The same holds true for my lowlanders indoors as houseplants. But for a lot of hobbyists that want to grow these plants, greenhouses and special lighting setups can be costly or unrealistic. Especially in my case. So I'm happy to wait a few extra years if that's what it takes to grow my plants out rather than just look at pictures of them in books. It seems that the hobby has dramatically expanded over the last 5 years or so. More plants are available and more people are experimenting with growing conditions.

What I'd be curious to see is how long a N. lowii for example in its native highland conditions would take to reach maturity as opposed to one grown in greenhouse condtions. The outdoor guys have the pests, weather, and other difficulties that greenhouse Neps might not experience. Would they grow at the same rate??

Glad you're still growin' a few outdoors for old time sakes!!

Thanks Hamish! Appreciate all of the positive feedback.

Joel
 
  • #10
Hello guys!

Michael: Thanks for your comments on my cell phone camera…;0) It is unusually too good to be part of a cell phone.  
smile_m_32.gif


So your lowlander adapt slower than the intermediate and highlanders. I have not put much attention to this, maybe I must. But what has surprised me is how fast my Judith Finn plants have adapted. All of them are pitchering like crazy, they started to pitcher like 2 week after their arrival, and now they are really big for a little time. I am very impressed with them.
smile_k_ani_32.gif


As for the bicalcarata, I have the same situation here with mine. It takes a little rest and then produce a lot of pitchers, and then another little rest and so on.

But my lowii seems to like it here a lot!  It has double its size in the months that it has been here, in the other hand I received a villosa together with my lowii and this one has not grown not a millimeter.  I also have a muluensis x lowii that is growing like crazy.

So I think that Hawaii and PR are good places to grow Nepenthes easily. Thanks to Heavens!
smile.gif


Joel & Hamish: Have you found any info about the growing rate of lowii in their natural environment? This could be of a great help. I have heard so many times about the low growth that these plants have, that I am wondering if maybe my lowii it is not a true lowii. Mine is growing too fast that I am scared.  
confused.gif


Cheers!
Jorge Joel…
Emilia’s Garden
 
  • #11
Em,

I'm interested in finding out growth rates of wild Neps as opposed to their greenhouse grown siblings too. One of the problems is that you'd have to compare several plants of the same species to get a benchmark. For example, I have 2 jacquelineaes that I bought at the same time, same size, years ago. One is at least twice the size of the other. If that was my only jac, I'd say that outdoor growing is the way to go. But that wouldn't be exactly true. So I think you need to compare multiple plants and species to get an idea.

I can compare my whole collection together though. Plants like ramispina and sanguinea have gone into the vining stage in a few years, where similar sized plants of other species are still rosetted. Most people would agree that ramispina and sanguinea are easy, vigorous growers compared to lowii and macrophylla. So you can get an overall "picture" of plant growth rates. And yes, lowii is one of those slower guys that takes time to mature. You don't see too many 12" lowiis or large rooted cuttings available for a reason!

Maybe someone like Rob at Borneo or some other growers with access to "wild" plants could shed more light on this.

Joel
Nepenthes Around the House
 
  • #12
There's a new forum especially for people who grow nepenthes outside.

Not much traffic yet, as it's just been estalished, but the content already there is very interesting, so head on over, all you outdoors growers!

http://pitcherplants.proboards34.com/
 
  • #13
I recieved a two inch lowii that is now three inches in 3 months. The pitchers seem a lot bigger now that they are outside also (by tht I mean I can reconize them as being pitchers).
 
  • #14
Oh I just wanted to remark that I have heard many times that seed grown plants (Neps) will grow much faster then TCed plants.
 
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