Nepenthes

drosera@gnu.ai.mit.edu
Sat, 6 Nov 93 18:30:49 -0501

Perry, here's a few pointers where you might get Nepenthes seeds or cuttings...

The book _The_Carnivorous_Plants_ by Juniper, Robins, and Joel says
the flowering season for Nepenthes plants growing in nature is March
to August. If any are producing seed pods they should be ripe
about now.

Bob Hanrahan of World Insectivorous Plants wrote in CPN a long time ago
that he is a ham radio operator. He may have contacts to other ham radio
operators in Malaysia. He was the source of a batch of N. rajah seeds
that were distributed about 10 years ago.

I wrote to several "soc.*" USENET groups last month asking for Nepenthes
seeds to be sent to Thomas Johnson. I haven't had any response so far.
There are lots of students from southeast Asia attending US colleges but
it's surprising that none seem interested in rainforest hiking in their
homelands or growing plants for a hobby.

Saint Louis Botanical Garden has or had a very good collection of Nepenthes.
I've been meaning to take a trip there but never got around to it. St.
Louis is about 250 miles away from here (Chicago is 300 miles). From what
I've heard about Nepenthes collections at various Botanical Gardens, Pring had
by far the best collection of Nepenthes when he was curator of the St.
Louis Botanical Garden. He then moved the collection to Longwood Gardens when
that garden opened and was named the curator there. If you (Perry) might
call anyone at the St. Louis Botanical Garden, and if you can get any donations
of Nepenthes cuttings, I can probably make a special trip there to pick up
the cuttings next spring and distribute them to the group. St. Louis
Botanical Gardens is also connected to the internet. I tried e-mailing
someone there but never got a response. They also have a gopher up.

I posted the following message once before. It is from the file
"intros seaone" on the e-mail group "seasia-l" (news from Southeast
Asian). Address is "listserv@msu.edu". I sent this fellow e-mail
twice but I never got an answer.

>
>From "Kamarudin Mat Salleh" <matsalle@HERBARIUM.BPP.MSU.EDU>
>
>Well I guess, I'll may as well introduce myself too. I had never done this
>on the Net.
>
>I am from Malaysia, currently towards the end of my Ph.D program in Botany
>at
>Michigan State. Graduating from National University of Malaysia
>[then in Jalan Pantai, Kuala Lumpur], I was sent to help setting up
>the Sabah Campus of the same university in 1982 before move on to Aberdeen
>Scotland in 1983 for my M.Sc. Returning back to Sabah to Malaysia in 1985,
>I was the Curator of UKMS Herbarium in Kota KInabalu and never miss great
>opportunity exploring this forest. I am working on Rafflesia,
>the largest flower in the world [Have you seen my book "Rafflesia:
>Magnificent
>flower of Sabah" ?].
>
>I would like to get in touch with my former Peace Corp lecturers if they
>subscribe to this group.
>
>Cheers.
>
>
>Kamarudin
>
>---
>K. Mat-Salleh
>
>SnailMail : EMail: Matsalle@msu.Bitnet
>Beal-Darlington Herbarium or Matsalle@herbarium.bpp.msu.edu
>Dept. Botany & Plant Pathology
>Michigan State University Voice: (517) 355-4696
>E. Lansing, MI 48824-1312 Fax: (517) 353-1926

---
Don Burden
New Albany, Indiana
drosera@gnu.ai.mit.edu