> I recently bought a small pot with three Drosera Capenis plants. I
> bought it at a local plant store. Along side the drosera was two
> Sarracenia Flava'a (mislabelled "purple pitcher plants"). All these
> plants had signs on them stating that they were created by tissue
> culture and not taken from the wild. I thought I read a while back
> that nobody has been able to tissue culture Sarracenias. Was I
> mis-informed? Are companies actively tissue culturing S. flava? Or
> was this tissue-culture label on the pot simply a lie? If they are
> skilled enough to tissue culture S. flava how come they seem unable to
> properly identify it compared to S. purpurea?
Just in case anyone thinks that 'tissue-cultured' or 'taken from the
wild' are the only alternatives, Sarracenia are really easy from
seed. Maybe seed-rasing is a little slow for anyone who wants to sell
the plants commercially - the same problem happens with cacti which I
grow too - a several year old cactus is only likely to sell for the
same amount as e.g. a few-week old fuchsia cutting. It takes me maybe
two years to get a reasonably sized little Sarracenia - possibly
tissue-culture can bring quicker results.
-- Clarke Brunt (clarke@brunt.demon.co.uk)