Plants in full regalia

Look at this Utricularia longifolia.

Three flowers and more on the way!

Just look at it.

I'm very proud.

I promised U. longifolia in my last post, and here it is. I love this plant!

Seeing this bloom show (which is far from over, by the way!) had me poking around the collection looking for plants are are in a similar state of full display. Most plants don't look their best 100% of the time, but these ones at least are currently looking spectacular.

Pinguicula 'Aphrodite' has a couple of cute blooms on it.

Hey there little guys!

Insanely, I have several friends who claim to not particularly care for this ping cultivar. How can you resist that little plant! It's much too adorable.

This large Drosera prolifera is doing very well, especially considering that I've had to separate out a couple of plants from this pot recently.

I think any pot of D. prolifera will inevitably end up a clump if it's happy.

The plants don't quite have the color they did in the middle of winter when things were quite chilly in the garage, but they're still looking pretty fabulous.

The plant that really caught my eye today, and which inspired this post (besides the U. longifolia) was definitely my beloved Drosera ×Dork's Pink.

Be still my heart.

This is just incredible. Based on a rough estimate, I'd guess there are upwards of 50 active traps on this plant, perfectly arranged in this beautiful pink spiral.

Nearby, my Byblis liniflora seems frozen in time as this unspeakably delicate assembly of dew.

This is still the plant that most people notice when they visit my collection.

I keep trying to find a good similie for it. Sort of like a stand of tiny, sticky trees. Or a city skyline. Such a good plant.

One plant I don't mention much, but of which I am very proud, is this Dionaea muscipula 'Justina Davis'.

Penny for scale. Those are big traps!

This is a nice, mature rhizome, as you can see by the trap size. So far it seems to be doing pretty well under my lights. I hope it gets enough of a dormancy in the garage.

Finally, this pot contains my original Drosera capensis, which is to say, my first ever carnivorous plant. I planted it into a large pot, which was a huge mistake, but really, who can resist a mass of D. capensis?

It's a jungle in there.

Someday soon I'll probably take this out and divide it all up, but for now it's sorta fun seeing it losing its mind. Looking good there, D. capensis!

Donate to assess carnivorous plants, get free gemmae

Happy holidays everyone! I hope everything is going well with you, your family, and especially your plants. I've got a chance for you to add something new to your collection, and do a good deed for the season at the same time!

Look at that fly man. Makes me want to donate some money.

The IUCN Red List is trying to assess the vulnerability of all carnivorous plant species. Naturally this is a huge effort, and the first step is this fundraiser – $25,000 to hold an initial 5-day workshop to create a baseline assessment for many species, and then subsequent goals to do field assessments across the world. This fundraiser has been active for a couple months and is only at 41%. HOWEVER, very often these fundraisers get a huge portion of their funding right at the end. So let's make it happen!

Earlier today I donated $25 to the effort. This is after having seen the appeals over and over. I now want to offer an additional incentive to you all to donate. If you donate $10 or more to this fund drive, I'll send you a free pack of pygmy sundew gemmae! Just email me a screenshot of your thank you screen (or message Sundews Etc. on Facebook) and I'll let you know what I have available! U.S. shipping only, alas.

These Drosera sargentii have recently gone absolutely nuts with gemmae.

There are lots of threats to carnivorous plants around the world. Pygmy sundews often have a very small native range, and many species could potentially be wiped out by development projects. Which ones are at highest risk? We don't know! Hopefully this assessment will help us find out.

Dionaea muscipula 'Justina Davis' is a rare cultivar, but that's another issue entirely.

The iconic Venus flytrap is one of the most mass-produced carnivorous plants in the world, and yet is under extreme pressure from poaching. North Carolina has recently cracked down on the wild collection of flytraps, but they're still under threat. Are there other places where better enforcement or more robust laws could help protect plants? Probably! Maybe this list can help us identify them.

These plants need your help! And a repotting.

Did you know that Drosera madagascariensis is extensively wild-collected in Madagascar for export? Most of the collection is done by local people to supply the natural medicine and cosmetics trade. Could there be ways to work with local people to build sustainable industries around their carnivorous plants? Sure! But we need to identify the problems before we can start working on the solutions.

I love pygmy sundews. I want everyone to grow them. I also want to be able to visit some of my favorite carnivorous plant species in the wild, to appreciate them in their unique habitats, and to gain insight by seeing their place in the broader ecological picture. Please donate in the next week so that we can take the first step to protecting these astonishing plants. If all you can spare is a couple bucks it will make a difference. And I've got all these gemmae sitting around after all!

Merry Christmas everyone.

Some new plants

Everyone (in the US at least) should check out Carnivorous Plant Auctions and Sales on Facebook. It's a great group to find uncommon plants for sale. Just recently I bought a couple plants from Brie, a grower in Washington state who has an amazing collection (I'm especially fond of her pings).

The first plant I got was a mature Pinguicula reticulata.

Some leaves fell off during potting, so I'm hoping I get some babies.

I just couldn't resist! I didn't want to wait for the little guy I got in the NASC auction to grow up.

Come on little guy!

And who knows, maybe it'll be two different clones and I can try cross-pollinating them at some point.

I also picked up a mature Dionaea 'Justina Davis'.

Flytraps are pretty cool I guess.

This all-green cultivar was registered by Barry Rice back in the days of yore (2006). Definitely a less-than-common cultivar with a funny story behind the name.

Finally, since I've been moving things around a bit under the lights I had room to start some new seeds. It's been a while since I started seeds!

Starting from seed is so exciting.

These four pots contain seeds of Drosera burmannii (Gunug Keledang), Drosera filiformis "Florida all-red", Drosera brevifolia (Kountze, TX), and Drosera tomentosa. It's been a while since I've started from seed, so I'm excited to watch these guys get going.