Curious Nepenthes....

[edwardyeeks]

Hi all, today I went along the LONG, LONG road in sungai buloh where many nurseries are there. As my mother was looking for some fountains and statues, I took the opportunity to have a peek in some of the nurseries I passed by.

Further down the road, a particular nursery caught my eye. Lot 61 had quite a number of neps that were very easy to see from the car. So I got down and browsed through the neps that were available.

There were n. xdyeriana, n. rafflesiana, n. xmiranda, n. xventrata and....what's this?? On first look, I thought of ventrata, but after a more thorough examination, NO, it certainly isn't ventrata.


This is the plant now in my home. This is the largest pitcher.


3 pitchers in line.


The whole plant.

I bought the plant for RM25. Taking a look, I think it has some albo traits in it. The interior is green, very similar to albomarginata. The pitchers are squat, but dark (looks nearly black!), kind of reminding me of albo. But without the white ring below the peristome, it definitely isn't just albo. What's more, the peristome is more developed compared to albomarginata. The peristome is like ventricosa's.

Please help me in IDing. Never seen this nep before, much less in sungai buloh nurseries. TIA

[NepNut]

Actually, this plants been appearing quite often in this thread, just check back the old posting for more details.

So far, It's either N. x Rebecca Soper (N. ramispina x ventricosa), N. x Red Lantern (most probabaly originated from EP) or N. gracilima x ventricosa. This is one of the nep hyrbrids along with N. x Dyeriana produced by TC originated from Taiwan/China.

Personally, I would go for N. x Rebecca Soper (N. ramispina x ventricosa) because I can't see any N. gracilima trait in it. Hope this help.

[edwardyeeks]

Thanks. Was outdated, what surprises me is that sungai buloh nurseries had them. Only Lot 61 had this, I didn't see it in any other nurseries.

Come to think of it, it has ramispina traits in it.....hmmm.

[marvin1997]

Ooh....looks nice!

[plantlover]

Nice buy, Edward. Hope you can increase your CP collection!

[edwardyeeks]

Thanks! It was repotted in old media. If there is one thing that I don't trust about most nurseries in sungai buloh is that their neps are planted in wrong media (black soil, for example that I found in this plant.)

Any other suggestions of what this nep is? Hopefully it is like what NepNut said.

[cbkhoon]

cameron has a lot of this !!

[funkychips]

Nice!!! Another lucky find for the day, eh Edward? I like the black pitchers, they are always so awesome!! Yeah I second Nepnut there, it has the lid and peristome shape and pitcher interior colouration of a ramispina and the outer colouration and surface texture of ramispina/ventricosa black.

Sg Buloh always has some rare stuff hidden in their nurseries, if you don't check you won't ever know it's there!

This plant, seeing that it might already be there for sometime, should have been acclimatized to the lowland weather. I find that EP plants are hardier than those from MT in terms of adaptability in warmer weather conditions. Just my two cents...

[kevyn chan]

another trade name is black knight and it is a fast grower....should be an intermediate hybrid and adapt very well in L/L....nice find! dont remove too much of the 'black soil' as it might retard the growth before acclimatisation occurs.

[edwardyeeks]

Thanks for the IDing, people!

Kevyn, I am trying out to remove all soil from the roots without damaging the roots. The reason why neps are stunted in growth when repotted is because roots are damaged during the process of removing the soil. I did this to my northiana and it's STUCK . So I tried soaking the roots (with the media clinging to it) and half the plant into a bucket of water. In the water, I slowly removed the media. Using my fingers, I sort of tickled the old media until it came of naturally. I am not sure whether this will always work, but I intend to try out and prove that soaking the roots and the old media in water will reduce the chances of root damage.