What's new
TerraForums Venus Flytrap, Nepenthes, Drosera and more talk

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Giant Cephalotus follicularis "myth or reality"

  • #41
If anybody has any doubts about the german giant size, look at these mature plants. Photo Courtesy of Mr. Frank Strzalkowski, (These plants are found in palmengarten, Frankfurt, Germany)

Gus

DSC01708.JPG
 
  • #42
What a spectacular photo and garden. Never seen so many in one place.

A few posts up...I can only see one photo...the one with the hand on the pot of cephs. Are there other's I can't see? Or was that a reference to the pic at the top of the page.

Any way of getting pics of the typical, giant and Julie's giant side by side? Actually if someone can email them to me, I can composite them into one photo adjacent to one another if that would help.

I will be thrilled if my little babies get as large as 2".

Thanks for the pics, Gus. Fascinating.

Suzanne
 
  • #43
Actually I was able to download 3 pics so I have put them together. I can't post it yet as I am at work and don't have my AOL anymore and I need to upload it to the server. So I have emailed it to myself at home and will post it later tonite. I couldn't get the pic of the Julie's giant because it was a PICT image and not a .jpg.

Suzanne
 
  • #45
The composite pic is coming...for some reason the pic never got to my home address. Probably because of the continuuing problem of overloaded email box and that preventing mail from being sent or received.

Suzanne
 
  • #47
Dear All:

The pictures you've seen so far are the product of a lot of time spent looking for them, patience, and good luck. As you may already know photos of cephalotus giants are hard to find in the net. I have others privately sent to me and they are going to be shown in the article. All I want now is a good picture of the hummer's giant and the giant form found in germany side by side "That's my dream come true". Well, actually, it would be to grow them together side by side. "that's my real dream".

Agustin
 
  • #48
I thought that pic of Hummer's Giant looked familiar that Jeff showed me at NECPS last Saturday... then i come back and see that it's the one already posted here!  Anyway, there are more of Jeff's photos, including several of different Cephs, on the NECPS web page.

Cephs

Jeff Matteson's Gallery
 
  • #49
Dear All:

The owner of these pictures goes by the name of Jonathan. He has his own website: www.cephalotus.info.

I think he's outdone himself this time. These pictures are fabulous. Giant cephs are a reality not a myth!!!. Please enjoy.

german giant
cephgermangiant.jpg


Hummer's giant
cephhummersgiant.jpg
 
  • #50
It looks like by the coloration of the plants that they have gotten very good light. Which leads me to believe that indeed it is the genetics and not the result of a low light situation which tends to increase plant size.

Very impressive!

Tony
 
  • #51
</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">It looks like by the coloration of the plants that they have gotten very good light. Which leads me to believe that indeed it is the genetics and not the result of a low light situation which tends to increase plant size.

Very impressive!

Tony

[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
I was thinking the same thing....Now what happens when you put Hummer's giant in a lowlight setting? Do the pitchers get even bigger?
wow.gif
 
  • #52
Tony,

From Jonathon's website...

"Another factor in the production of large pitchers is light levels. In full sun, Cephalotus will pitcher and these pitchers will be well coloured, but they will be small compared to those produced in shade. The way round this is to grow them initially in shade (approx 50%) and to slowly introduce them to more light, to bring out the purple colouration."

So this might explain how they are deep in color.
 
  • #53
Hmm Ok so I guess the question still is are they still 'Giant' if they are grown in the same conditions as normal clones. IE will you be able to look at a batch of plants and say ok yes those there have obviously much larger pitchers than the rest all other factors being equal.

Tony
 
  • #54
Emesis:

He also says that he doesn't care for that coloration, so he grows his in part shade all the time.

I have to say, thought, that that ceph is pretty colorful.  I guess shade is a rather ambiguous term.

Gus, you said there were distinguishing features between "giant" and typical besides pitcher size. Would you please explain in detail what those features are?
 
  • #55
The initial variation in size and color I noted in my own plants seems to hve evened out under my care. These plants are in Stewardship, and were grown to maturity by another grower to whom I am acting as a caretaker. I can discern not a lot of difference between my "Typical" and "Giant" forms. but the "red" clone really does seem different, producing longer and thinner pitchers with greater coloration under the same light conditions. These I can easily tell apart. As to the others, I feel that time will tell: my Giant form is a small cutting, but is producing pitchers as large as my mature plants. Will the pichers continue to get significantly larger? Or, was it just that a larger pitcher was used for the cutting? I can't say, but this season should tell me a lot. My plants are bursting into new growth now, with old pitchers browning off and rapid new growth starting..

I do agree the way to get large colored pitchers is to grow them in lower light for size and gradually acclimate them to high light. I also feed each pitcher with pill bugs twice in the season: nutrition plays a role in pitcher size as well.

I have yet to see the "egg sized" pitchers I have heard of, although I have some nearly 3 inches on my "typical" clone. I would love to see such!

If I haven't mentioned it before, don't be in a hurry to remove yellowing older pitchers until they brown off as the food reserves in these pitchers will be translocated to the plant, and are of value to it.
 
  • #56
It's strange you should mention that, Tamlin.  I mean, the part about your cephs bursting into new growth.  I was just going to post the following two pictures before i read that:

20030531-CP-Cephalotus-4.5in.%20pot.jpg
20030626-CP-Cephalotus-4.5in.pot.jpg


The first was taken four weeks ago, to demonstrate how slowly my plant has grown (especially in pitcher size) since i got it a year ago.  In the last week, it has suddenly sent out three or four MUCH bigger pitchers (still small compared to your 3" monsters, though).  The strangest thing about that is that it's under growlights, and has been for quite some time, so i wouldn't expect it to be on the same cycle as yours.

If i was a superstitious person, i would attribute the magical spurt of growth to the bit of soil i begged off of a certain successful Ceph grower as innoculant, in case there really is anything to the rumored fungal mutualism.  I realize that the conditions my plant endures would not promote any beneficial interaction with mycorhyzae (sp?) as currently understood, but it does make me wonder a bit.

Then again, it could be just a coincidence that the plant finally decided to do something with itself.
 
  • #57
I don't discount the mycorhizal hypothesis, just caution that there are fungi and then there are not so fun guys. I have all my plants under growlights as well, but you know, I believe the plants see right through the growlights into the heart of the Magic Sun. This is the time to grow and go...in the last week, plants that sat there doing nothing except not die have all burst into growth.

In my mini bog, as well as in the 200 acre bog I frequent I notice a very fine white fungal network glistening in the morning dew. In the mini bog it is not always visable, but whenever it appears I notice a distinct increase in growth rate of all the plants in there, esp. Dionaea. I too used a bit of this as an innoculant in my pots. Now, it could be coincidental: both the plants growth and the presence of this fungi might be related to ideal cultural seasonal conditions, and have nothing to do with each other. I did place a single rosette of the pygmy Drosera species D. nitidula ssp alantostigma in the bog, and was amazed to see the size it reached: larger than a 50 cent piece, and how else to account for the disparity in size? It's obviously getting something the other rosettes in peat/sand aren't getting, and it's not from increased prey capture. I am going to place a cutting of my own little Cephalotus that I have been growing for over a year in there to see if it speeds the maturing of it, as I speculate it will. I'll keep you posted as to my results.
 
  • #58
Dmuscipula, My typical plant showed a similar burst of energy this spring. This year it is growing pitchers three to four times the size of the old pitchers. Is this just because this spring may have been more favorable for ceph growth? It was cooler than usual I guess.

Cole
smile.gif
 
  • #59
Dear all:

I would like to say that i love to discuss these matters for months or years to come until we get a definite answer. We can't comprehend anything in absolute terms. If you remember that, then you'll be fine.

The main differences between the german giant and the hummer's giant is the T-ventral rib (the hummer's giant has a wider rib than the german, as well as the peristome (the peristome in the hummer's giant is thicker. I have also noticed that the average size of the hummer's giant is 10% larger than the german, but I guess, one will be closer to the truth, if we were to measure the average size of all the pitchers between the two types and then, make a comparison. I guess Jonathan is in a very good position to do this.

William: I have the large egg size pictures, but I am still waiting for my local cp society to publish the article on the net and I promised Julie Jones not to post it until the whole thing was published or posted somewhere. I was wondering if someone here can make room for the article on this website. I'll be more than happy to post it here, of course, if i am allowed to do so.

For the mycorrhyzal theories. i do believe they play a part in it, but as some of you may know, I am actually growing several cephalotus clones, and believe me, to have a large pitcher size cephalotus "typical" is very difficult. I am wondering if William's so called typical are in fact typical cephalotus. Nowadays, one must be careful with terminology. Julie Jones from the U.K. grows all her cephs under the same exact conditions, but then again, she says that there is only one giant ceph plant in her collection which still produces giant pitchers (genetics over environmental). Furthermore, when she got her giant ceph, she did not know it was in fact a giant form.

Therefore, it is very possible that one of William's typical cephalotus plants is a giant form and not typical. If it happened to Julie, it could have happened to William.

Agustin Franco
 
  • #60
Agustin,
I would say the average Hummers pitcher is bigger than the average German pitcher. While the average typical form pitcher in my collection for a mature plant is about 2 - 2.25 inches.
I am also growing a cutting from Julie Jones's plant - its about a year old and has a couple of pitchers around 3/4 inch, so, it's looking quite good.
I'd be very interested to see your article on giant Cephs when it is ready.

Jonathan
Cephalotus follicularis
 
Back
Top