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A nice surprise

  • Thread starter schmiggle
  • Start date
Yesterday morning I found the first flower on my Drosera filiformis had finally opened!
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I'm sure this is old hat to most people here, but it is my first flower on a carnivorous plant :-D It's got a whole lot of buds waiting to open, most of which you can see in the photo. It hadn't occurred to me that there might be a flower with pistils outside the stamens, and yet here we are--I guess it probably makes self pollination more effective.
Once I get seeds, I'll cold-stratify and try to germinate them. There's another small sundew in this one's pot, and based on it, I'm guessing 2-3 years until flowering size? Maybe a bit longer.
 
It certainly can be a trick just finding sundew flowers open, since a lot of species only keep their flowers open for an hour or two at an awkward time mid-morning. Good luck with the seeds!
 
Congratulations, the first flower is always a nice milestone.
 
LOL! Sundew flowers often flower when I 'm at work!
 
It certainly can be a trick just finding sundew flowers open, since a lot of species only keep their flowers open for an hour or two at an awkward time mid-morning. Good luck with the seeds!
LOL! Sundew flowers often flower when I 'm at work!
Yeah, mine does that too. I was working from home yesterday, I probably saw this around 9:30. There's a solid chance I've already missed one from today :glare:
 
One more update, because it's an oddity, and then I promise I'll stop :p
Today it made a mutant flower with four part symmetry!
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I've never seen this before (I counted, by the way, and it has four stamens stamens, if you can't tell from the photo, in addition to the clearer four petals and sepals). I personally find it less attractive--it looks like it needs filling out--but nonetheless I'm tempted to try to make a cutting to see if I can preserve the feature. Is there any way to do that without destroying the rest of the inflorescence? Is there any way to do it at all?
 
It's not something that will ever be heritable; just like the occasional split or double leaf and trap leaves replacing flower parts, it's a random somatic mutation, not a genetic anomaly. You certainly could try to just pop off the one bud and try to make it sprout, but your chances of success would be very low (not enough plant material, the bud would probably just die) and it would be more beneficial to either cut the whole stalk or get seeds.
Also, from what I can see in the photos, your plant is D. tracyi, not filiformis.
 
It's not something that will ever be heritable; just like the occasional split or double leaf and trap leaves replacing flower parts, it's a random somatic mutation, not a genetic anomaly. You certainly could try to just pop off the one bud and try to make it sprout, but your chances of success would be very low (not enough plant material, the bud would probably just die) and it would be more beneficial to either cut the whole stalk or get seeds.
Also, from what I can see in the photos, your plant is D. tracyi, not filiformis.
Ok, thanks for the info, that makes sense. I figured a seed pod would probably be too small anyway.
What makes you say this is D tracyi? It doesn't particularly matter to me, other than winter care, but I believe the clone is supposed to come from North Carolina, and I thought tracyi only grows in Florida. Maybe it was mislabeled or a mistake ???
Edit: Drosera tracyi is a gulf coast endemic, so not just florida, but definitely not North Carolina either.
 
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  • #10
In the second photo I see leaves that are drooping to the sides instead of standing upright, bearing extremely dense, very pale tentacles and the flower is a lighter pink than I would expect from filiformis. Also, if the leaves are exceeding 1-1.5' in length that further strengthens the likelihood of it being D. tracyi. The species does not only grow in Florida, but it is a Gulf plant, not found on the Atlantic seaboard so it had to be mislabeled.
 
  • #11
That point about droopy leaves with dense pale tentacles is interesting. I will note that those leaves are old and trying to track the sun--because of seasonal change, I have had to move the plant back so it would still get enough full sun, but these leaves finished growing before I did so. New leaves have the characteristic red tentacles and are growing straighter. Does this still match with tracyi?
Leaves are probably 10" long, perhaps a bit longer.
 
  • #12
Filiformis generally has longer and sparser tentacles, while the tentacles on the leaf margins are especially long and reflex toward the underside of the leaf. Tracyi tentacles are more uniform in length, shorter, much denser, and exhibit very little color.

Filiformis:
sCfW9D7.jpg


Tracyi:
DvtJ4s7.jpg
 
  • #13
Nimbulan's photos are a good representation. If the new leaves are getting redder and straighter, it might be a sign of filiformis but even the plants I have that are a bit on the shady side (aka the ones indoors) still stay more or less upright and with long tentacles. If the plant retains traits of both however it may be D. x californica, the hybrid between the two species.
 
  • #14
I suspect it's D. x californica, then. The leaves are completely green--they never develop a red tint. The leaves remain upright unless they track the light heavily enough that they fall over. The tentacles seem like they're in between in length, and are not particularly crowded. They're very red-tipped as long as they're in bright light.
Here's a picture of a new leaf:
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Apologies that it's rotated sideways. Does my suggestion sound about right?
 
  • #15
I'd still leave it in full sun for a while before making the call. Some D. tracyi can have pretty red tentacle tips (only the tips though; filiformis and hybrids will have the whole gland color up) in strong light even if white or pinkish is more typical. The tentacle density looks somewhere between tracyi and californica, so it may well be the hybrid.
 
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