CP 'Field' Trip

Whirlabout@aol.com
Mon, 3 Apr 1995 21:04:12 -0400

I had an excellent opportunity this weekend to do some pleasant
traveling, see an extremely large variety of CP, and meet some
very friendly-knowledgeable people. I got to see more in 3 hours
than I have in a week of criss-crossing the Southeast US.

Before you purchase tickets to some exotic locale, the people I
met were Tom Hayes and Krissy Mott, both regular contributors on
the listserver. The location: Tom's new apartment. I've been
trying for a while to get Tom to sell me some of his CP to re-
jumpstart my dwindling collection (victims of 1)a burrowing
rodent, 2)some severe winters & 3)an over demanding job). Tom
prefers to trade but agreed to sell me some plants from his
collection and after a little arm twisting 8^) he invited me to
pick up my order at his apartment.

Although Tom lost a large quantity of dormant CP in the move, he
still has a huge number of plants. Some observations:

- *Very* large Cephalotus growing in a small flat (with other
drosera and pings). The cephalotus had pitchers over 2 inches
long and was growing in a very dry, sandy mix of sand and some
peat.

- Many of Tom's plants were growing in what appeared to be
extremely dry conditions and apparently thriving, drier than I
thought CP could tolerate regularly.

- "All red" VFT. This plant (and offspring) were amazing. All
parts of the plant including leaves and traps were a dark red.
Incredible!

- "Dentate" VFT with deep red traps. All of the trap fingers are
doubled, creating an unusual plant, looking almost bushy on each
side of the trap.

- Young Heliamphora plants, which I thought were Sarracenia
hybrids (psittacina X purpurea). Although it's a stretch to see
the similarities in full grown plants, young plants are a
different story.

- Drosera and pings from around the world were everywhere along
with more than 20(?) types of Nepenthes. His Australian sundew
collection is also impressive.

Tom has a green thumb with propagating plants. He has clones of
almost every plant in his collection and very large numbers of
some (VFTs, Cephalotus, pings (esp. Mexican) and several
sundews).

Good people and lots of unusual plants made for an unexpected
pleasure of a visit. Thanks Tom & Krissy.

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It is never too late to be what you might have been.
- George Eliot

Ron
whirlabout@aol.com
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