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Post by mikuláš on Sept 1, 2010 4:49:17 GMT -10
This is my clone of N. Redneck, a hybrid grex made by BobH, consisting of toyoshimae x maxima = [(truncata x “thorelii”) x maxima].The toyoshimae is not quite like the majority of truncata x' thorelii out there – you can see BobH’s photos of it here (actually, these may be the only photos of this plant on the Internet): pithotomy.com/toyoplant.jpgpithotomy.com/toyotrap.jpgRedneck is a vigorous, somewhat Rokko-like plant with long tendrils. I obtained it in June 2009, when it was just two years old (fairly large for its age). Its pitchers have evolved quite a bit over the past year, so I thought it would be interesting to document its development here. My apologies in advance for the amateur picture quality, and my cheapy camera. After a few months outside it went to live in a light box, under 2 HO T5 bulbs and 70% RH. December 2009Here’s its first pitcher in the light box: Here you can see its last pitcher from outdoor growing beside its second pitcher in the light box – getting bigger fast: Next to a small Miranda pitcher for shape comparison: March 2010: A couple winter/early spring pitchers: May 2010Getting bigger – the plant has roughly quadrupled in size in less than a year: You can see the steady development of the peristome, from rather thin to much more flared. Though Bob may not have had this in mind when he named the grex after a certain group of people in the American South, the pitcher column between the mouth and subtly bulbous bottom gets a reddish flush in strong light, giving this clone a "red neck". It grows a lot faster in heat (mid-upper 70s F / mid 90s F) than in the winter (low 60s F / upper 70s, lows 80s F), but has never gone dormant. It’s currently blooming with two flower stalks at just 3 years old.
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Post by mikuláš on Aug 25, 2010 9:24:36 GMT -10
Interesting. I have a maxima x TM (much smaller than yours) that similarly activated a side node (not a basal) that continues to grow, albeit smaller, along with the main tip. The main vine at this point is only about 3" tall.
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Post by mikuláš on Aug 13, 2010 3:47:16 GMT -10
Gorgeous echinostomata, Ken! Clearly the plant is enjoying your growing conditions.
Your Dyeriana will no doubt be a monster one day.
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Post by mikuláš on Aug 6, 2010 7:47:17 GMT -10
Nice display, Sam. The Caesars out in front are spectacular -- if that doesn't draw people in, then they need eye exams
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Post by mikuláš on Jul 7, 2010 4:00:40 GMT -10
Thanks, Sam. That definitely fills in the blanks for me
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Post by mikuláš on Jul 6, 2010 4:22:59 GMT -10
Are there any inermis hybrids where inermis outshines the other parent?
Beautiful plant, Sam.
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Post by mikuláš on Jul 6, 2010 4:21:41 GMT -10
OK, so I know this thread is a bit old, but I've been thinking about this plant and wanted to put a couple questions out there for Sam: If you compare the photos of 'Dark Night' to those of 'Puna', it seems the 'Dark Night' lower pitchers (and maybe uppers, too?) are a lot smaller than the those of 'Puna'. What do you contribute the size difference to? Are the whole plants of 'Dark Night' generally smaller than the 'Puna' grex? To me it looked like the 'Rokko' pitchers (female parent of 'Dark Night') are somewhat smaller than the maxima you used to make 'Puna', but perhaps not enough to explain the apparent size difference. I guess I'm basically curious whether you think the presence of the "thorelii" in the female parent tipped the scales so that the progeny would be smaller-statured plants vis-a-vis 'Puna', which differs by only one "ingredient". Part of my general curiosity of how to breed small plants
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Post by mikuláš on Jul 1, 2010 4:15:29 GMT -10
I would like to offer an alternative perspective closer to Sam's. While I believe I understand the reasoning behind what morbus & philgreen are saying, notice the implicit claim being made here: If we assume Darwinian evolution to be the method by which organisms have differentiated into the various forms we know today, then we assume that random genetic mutation is the reason we have things as varied as strep throat bacteria and elephants. Wikipedia states that there are between 7 and 100+ million species of organisms on earth. Keeping these facts in mind, the number of random mutations necessary to get an elephant from a single-celled eukaryote is mind-boggling to say the least -- I'd guess billions or trillions or even zillions. To then say that of these innumerable mutations that only those mutations that contribute to survival or at least don't hamper survival are passed on to subsequent generations seems statistically improbable. It seems to me like we're trying to have our cake and eat it, too: On the one hand, we claim a very messy, random process to produce variation. But then we assert a very clean process of pairing down those variants -- a single principle (easily comprehended by humans, as luck would have it!) determines which variations are perpetuated. Does anyone else see the incongruity here?
In my own amateur mind I can easily imagine a scenario in which a certain genetic mutation, by virtue of it's randomly-arrived-at chemical structure, becomes dominant even though it actually reduces reproductive success, if only by a little. Before natural selection can weed it out, however, the organism quickly breeds with other members of the population (it's a fairly fast-breeding species, after all), and that less-than-optimal gene gets spread all over the place and because it's dominant, its associated phenotype is the one seen more and more commonly in the population. Soon the genetically optimal organisms are in the minority (since their genes are recessive), and with time the phenotype produced by their optimal genes becomes rarer. So now we see "evolution" at work not because of increased "success" (whatever that is), but simply by chemical accident. In a world of zillions of random mutations, I don't see how we could rule this possible path of development out.
I think Sam is on to something when he talks about "noise" in the process. After all, if anything is ever to evolve, the process of reproduction has to generate lots of different mutations in the offspring; that is, "variability is inherent in nature". Put simply, we can't rule out the internal "pressures" that also drive evolution -- factors internal to the biochemical process of generating variants itself.
Or so it seems to my (at times rational) mind.
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Post by mikuláš on Jun 25, 2010 4:26:49 GMT -10
Yes! I love this stuff! Finally, causality is called on the carpet I really enjoy seeing people expose the metaphorical nature of our understanding of the world around us. Both "specialization" and "competition" are metaphors taken from our human experience and projected onto natural phenomena. Like all metaphors, these two notions give us important insight into what's going on with Nepenthes, but they simultaneously obscure other facets of their existence/life cycles (revealing/obscuring is the nature of metaphoric thought). It's only when we're aware of the metaphors themselves (as Sam is forcing us to be with his remarks) that we can understand the limits of our "knowledge"....and then we try to come up with other metaphors to catch what we missed the first time OK, I'll go back into my cognitive philosophical cave now...
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Post by mikuláš on Jun 24, 2010 4:03:29 GMT -10
Very nice, Sam. Did you do this cross twice, or only once? I remember the 'Odysseus' grex, and then I seem to recall another name in another post...or maybe I'm just confused?
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Post by mikuláš on Jun 21, 2010 10:15:06 GMT -10
I like the idea of a lowii x clipeata, and an izumiea x clipeata...nice and dark, maybe with some toothiness to the peristome. A purple singalana might also have a similar result. I think sanguinea x clipeata could be a good cross because it might result in fast-growing offspring that could be back-crossed to clipeata (the next time it flowers, of course, which may not be predictable). Since finding a female clipeata to make more clipeatas may prove difficult, it could be a goal to make more clipeata look-alikes, kinda like (clipeata x eymae) x clipeata, which looks very similar to clipeata. A batch of seedlings from the back-cross of (sanguinea x clipeata) x clipeata could then produce lots of male AND female clipeata look-alikes, to be used in other hybrids or further back-crossing. Seems the current clipeata look-alike, (clipeata x eymae) x clipeata, is a male, which limits what you can cross it with. Of course I'm only dreaming....whatever's in bloom will do
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Post by mikuláš on May 24, 2010 4:23:31 GMT -10
Reminds me of thorelii x aristolochioides, except with a more interesting peristome and perhaps a more graceful shape. Very, very nice!
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Post by mikuláš on Apr 30, 2010 4:42:52 GMT -10
Kain -- how do you know it was too acidic? Doesn't BTB just indicate acid, neutral, base?
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Post by mikuláš on Apr 29, 2010 14:00:00 GMT -10
I think flushing is essential if you want to avoid a gradual up-creep in the amount of salts accumulating in your medium, provided there are salts in your water to begin with. At least you can hold the salt-level of the soil closer to the level in the water by flushing.
Having done more reading, I think another reason Michael grows his plants rapidly is the amount of wind he gets (I know, it's been said before). The increased rate of transpiration ultimately sucks more water up through the roots, pulling more nutrients with it, which increases the rate of nutrient absorption and, given good temps to keep metabolic rates primed, leads to faster growth. Or at least that's the mechanism as I understand it.
Haha, Celestial Drops...who'da thunk it....now, if only the makers of the water would have funded the study!
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Post by mikuláš on Apr 29, 2010 9:18:29 GMT -10
Amazing....I, too, was confused at first and didn't see where the glass plants were in those pictures
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