Are you my mother?

Nepenthe · Feb 9, 2004

I often wonder, what makes "my first nepenthes" ... well... my first nepenthes?
Where is the "brain" of a plant anyway?

When my Nepenthes sends up side shoots, are those to be considered new plants, or mature plants -like the parent? I often hear people, including myself, ask how long it will take my N. whateverensis pups to make pitchers as large as their base/mother plant. Are they the same plant?

Not until they are severed and develop their own roots, I would think. So what if I have a mature Nepenthes that suddenly goes into the Brown Crispy stage for some reason. I give it a little TLC.. some superthrive, humidity, whatever. I let it sit for a while... After a few months, viola! a tiny shoot appears at the surface. The plant lived!
Or did it. After all, that shoot could be a fragment of the mother plant, but if so, will it again reach mature status? Will it begin a new life as a juvenille 'Nep?

People talk about dividing crowns. I recall a post in a Cephalotus thread that talked about removing crown divisions from the mother plant, and then repotting. What if you accidentally removed to much... lets say you split the mother plant in half! -Or something along those lines... Did you just kil the plant, or make it go to a Better Place™?

Is it the DNA of the plant that establishes the maturity?
The size of the base/rhizome?
The development of the root system?

What are your opinions, perhaps there is even an answer to this query somewhere...
-Trevor

(okay, nosey, I *did* just lose my very fist Nepenthes to the Brown Crispy stage... I have it sitting in my grow chamber... erm... "meditating" I hope I'll see some green or something one of these months -but is that still the same plant?)

And while your online, don't forget to stop by
http://www.tfdepot.com/search.itml?icQuery=sarracenia
to view the lovely sarracenia liles!
-yes that was sarcastic, that website pisses me off and directly adresses the issue of pitcher plant poaching/vandalism or pitcher harvesting or whatever.

eplants02 · Feb 9, 2004

Curse those people selling cut Sarracenia pitchers!!!!!

cool85k5 · Feb 9, 2004

Where are they getting the pitcher at?Wild collecting,private stock?If they own the plants and grow them,I guess they can do what ever they want,but if they collect them from wild populations

It makes me mad!

Jerry

peter · Feb 9, 2004

You should email them, because I've heard that some nurseries grow sarracenias just for that purpose of flower decorations, and some evil nurseries go through bogs and chop down whole fields of wild sarracenias!

Nepenthe · Feb 9, 2004

I emailed flower depot. So can you -just don't be super aggressive or adversarial. Such an attitude will compell the customer service person to simply disregard the email.

I have recieved no reply yet. I may contact some of the OTHER companies out there (just search for "sarracenia lily").
I am drawing MINIMAL conclusions about Flower Depot's practices (or a related supplier).
But come on... I just don't see a company setting up shop -or at least part of a shop, just to harvest Sarracenia pitchers... or liles, or whatever once or twice a year when they reach the required size. It seems easier to just buy them from the poachers -much higher yeild.

BTW, try to keep comments related to this sub-topic to the dedicated thread in the conservation room. I simply felt like bringing it up in this post.

'taa
-Trevor

swords · Feb 10, 2004

Trevor,

The offshoots are the means by which Nepenthes reproduce vegetatively/assexually incase something should happen to the main vine this is a "backup" set of the same genes. The offshoots can also flower if they are grown long enough. The top of your plant is always the oldest/most mature portion and will be the soonest to flower. Some species are very prolific when making offshoots. There are two forms:

Underground stolons: plants like N. ampullaria and N. bicalcarata who can send a runner many meters away from the main plant and send up a new shoot. N. ampullaria sends up so many offshoots that it makes a carpet

Basal shoots: the plants like N. fusca and N. rajah which send up new shoots at the very base of the main vine. Each shoot is a new "plant" but it does indeed share the exact same DNA as the mother vine it comes from. When you take a cutting from a vine you are doing the original form of "cloning". A plant sending up a shoot is doing it's own cloning.

By "Cutting it in half" you mean that you cut off the top portion it then it shouldn't be a problem. This sometimes induces basal shoots, it's generally a shift in the hormones that run through the plant which "triggers" the offshoot production but some plants are naturally rapid reproducers and will make more shoots without any intervention from you.

The book Gardening With Carnivores by Nick Romanowski details exact steps of how the floral industry cultivates Sarracenias for the cut flower trade. For what it's worth I hope they're following proper procedure.

Khai · Feb 10, 2004

I would also like to highly recommend two more books,
http://www.timberpress.com/books/index.cfm?do=details&ID=557
http://www.timberpress.com/books/index.cfm?do=details&ID=338
Both are excellent and as far as im concerned must haves.

Nepenthe · Feb 10, 2004

Thanks for the reply, swords. Although that does answer some questions, the "meat" of my post was asking *what makes "your pland" your plant?*

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]"By "Cutting it in half" you mean that you cut off the top portion it then it shouldn't be a problem. "
I was referring to dividing the rhizome in half. It sounds like you are describing the "decapitation" procuedure commonly used on sundews.

In what part of the plant is it's "identity" contained. ie. what part of the plant grows up and matures. Obviously a Nepenthes can't just come out of seed/TC and start sprouting flower stalks and 12cm pichers. Roots? Rhizome?
For instance, My 3 year old Nepenthes alata produces an offshoot that eventualy is severed from the mother plant but contains identical genetic info. Can I tell people: "This is my first plant" pointing to the alata in a jug... "but... this is also my first plant" -pointing to an alata in a hanging basket.
Since the mother plant still exists, that example is not too hard.

However, lets say I cut my eight year old S. flava rhizome in half. Which part of the rhizome retains the "brain" of the plant... will they both start acting like eight year old plants?

Over the life of the plant, something develops/evolves. Is this a genetic thing, or that maturing of some different part of the plant?
-Trevor

Tony Paroubek · Feb 10, 2004

Maturing takes place in the meristem of the plant. IE the growth point. Typically if you cut the top off a Nepenthes that is producing upper pitchers (ie mature) then it will continue to do so. It is possible to have a mature Nepenthes only 6 inches tall and producing a flowerstalk if the tip was recently removed and rooted.. So to be correct in which do you call the original plant. You call the original, the one that was the first shoot from the seed, since this will be the chronologically oldest meristem. In your example I don't think it matters which you call your first plant as they are both your first plant since you are referring to a time the plant was obtained in relation to other plants in your care. Even though one is a recently rooted cutting it is still in your posession longest.

Dormant lateral buds usually contain the same genetic age stamp as the apical meristem when they were formed. IE the lower down the plant the younger the dormant meristem 'thinks' it is.

Tony

Nepenthe · Feb 10, 2004

Thanks for the helpful info, Tony. Along different lines, Barry Rice mentioned to me the whole DNA aspect of it:
"As for your multiple "copies" of your first plant, yes, it is interesting to think about. You have multiple clones, that share the exact same DNA. Botanists refer to these separate individuals descending from the same clone as ramets."

Since it is usually the seeds or meristem used in tissue culture... would that mean that a plant TC'ed from a meristem would start growing at the same level of maturity as the meristem?

Graci'
-Trevor

Tony Paroubek · Feb 10, 2004

[b said:
Quote[/b] (Nepenthe @ Feb. 10 2004,13:51)]... would that mean that a plant TC'ed from a meristem would start growing at the same level of maturity as the meristem?

Graci'
-Trevor

I don't believe this is the case. The meristem is lost once it goes into forming a mass of undifferentiated callus tissue. Plants produced from this tissue once placed on nonproliferation media are essentially like plants produced from seed.

Tony