I'll never see lower pitchers

[Hikenyura]

I recently got a nepenthes cutting, but I recently read that when you have vine cuttings you'll probably never see any lower pitchers, is there any way i could see lower pitchers.

[glider14]

wait for basal shoots to come up. what plant is it?
Alex

[Hikenyura]

alata, it was a question on general nepenthes anyways, I heard that n. alata's upper and lower pitchers are pretty similar

[glider14]

depends...is it alata...or ventrata? got any pics of pitchers?
Alex

[Michael Catalani]

hikenyura said:

alata, it was a question on general nepenthes anyways, I heard that n. alata's upper and lower pitchers are pretty similar

Most every species of Nepenthes will eventually produce additional basal rosettes with lower pitchers.

The vine tips contain a harmone which suppresses buds on the vines and basal rosettes, but the level of this suppression is different from species to species. N. khasiana will produce multiple basal rosettes almost continuously, no matter how long any of the vines are. Others may only produce a rosette once a vine tip is of significant distance from the basal area of the plant. (It should be noted that plants from TC may produce additional basals continuously if the level of BAP, 2ip, or other growth harmone is still high inside the plants tissue. These harmones offset the suppressing harmone in the vine tip.)

It should also be noted that a basal shoot is sometimes the best way to get extremely large lower pitchers in some species. It's not unusual to start off with a small plant producing small lowers, only to have the plant revert to producing upper pitchers before the plant produces large textbook sized lower pitchers. But the plant continues to grow a larger root system, and you will usually find that once the plant starts producing new basal offshoots, that the lower pitchers on these offshoots will become much larger than the lowers on the original plant.

One species that comes to mind on the point above is N. spathulata. I grew dozens of these from small plants, and the plants started vining after the lowers were just a few inches in length. This was really disappointing, because the lowers can be large and rather dramatic. It was only after the vine grew some distance that the plant started producing basals, which produced the really nice lower pitchers.

[flytraper]

michaelcatalani said:

I grew dozens of these from small plants, and the plants started vining after the lowers were just a few inches in length. This was really disappointing, because the lowers can be large and rather dramatic. It was only after the vine grew some distance that the plant started producing basals, which produced the really nice lower pitchers.

that would explain why my ventricosa has started vining when the lowers were only 2 inches long