N. alata or N. ventrata ??

[tje25]

Hello everyone!

This was one of my first neps and shortly after I bought it someone told me (I believe it was Wire-man) that It was probably not a true N. alata, and that in fact it was most likely a N. ventrata. So I emailed the place that I got it from to ask questions, In the reply they swore up and down that they were familiar with all of the online forums and the naming of plants and such. Then went on to say that they were sure that I had a true N. alata.

Unfortunitly it was too small at the time to tell for sure. It has grown quite a bit since then and has multiple pitchers now so I was hopeing somebody would be able to tell me for sure one way or the other.

Also, What are the differences between an alata and a ventrata?

Thanks in advance for the help!
Just to be sure I took multiple pictures of each pitcher(starting from oldest to youngest, then one of the whole plant.

Thanks for looking

 

[Cthulhu138]

ventrata

 

[Nepenthesis]

What's throwing me off is the wings... There are wings on it. N. ventricosa doesn't have wings and neither do some forms of alata, but I have a form of alata with wings. I'm not good at ID'ing neps, so take what I say for a grain of salt...

 

[tje25]

Okay,
Thanks for the input guys!! Johnny, Why do you say it is a ventrata? What is the difference?

 

[Cthulhu138]

That just looks like your classic ventrata. You can really see the ventricosa influence in the last pic. Nothing about it screams alata to me.

 

[tje25]

That just looks like your classic ventrata. You can really see the ventricosa influence in the last pic. Nothing about it screams alata to me.

Cool! thanks!

 

[swords]

That's a pretty standard Ventrata the plant sold as "N. Alata" at nurseries everywhere.

 

[tje25]

Thanks Swords!

 

[Cthulhu138]

This is the same plant you have. I also bought it as Nepenthes alata from a nursery.
<a href="http://s1109.photobucket.com/albums/h434/Nepenthes138/Greenhouse/?action=view&current=4-22-12007.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1109.photobucket.com/albums/h434/Nepenthes138/Greenhouse/4-22-12007.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

 

[tje25]

They do look really close to each other dont they

 

[Cthulhu138]

Yeah, and the smaller pitchers are identical to yours.

 

[Rocketcaver]

Several already beat me to it, but your pitchers look almost exactly like a ventrata I used to have. It sure was a viner after it got going! Very easy to care for and not picky at all about temp and humidity. Very good at pitchering too.

 

[swords]

I have a new cross of N. Ventrata made by EP using their N. ventricosa 'k' x N. alata 'red' or 't' (I forget which alata)
so far makes pitchers like this:

http://alienflora.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/epventrata3.jpg

(link is to a shot of one of my seed grown EP ventrata plants)

Though sometimes the pitchers are far squatter and look like a soda can / pitcher. Leaves and overall plant size take after ventricosa and stay compact despite putting out larger and larger pitchers.

 

[Cthulhu138]

Wow, that one just looks like a ventricosa 'Red' to me. Nice plant.

 

[swords]

There are a few different pitcher shapes that pop out of this one, the ones that are fat and squat like a soda can look almost like ventricosa x sibuyanensis pitchers then they move towards these taller more waisted ones.