My next stop on the trip was England. I spent the 1st day studying
herbarium at Kew. There wasn't much TYPE material of interest to me, but
there were many and varied interesting CP collections. On my 2nd day in
England there was the CP meeting at Reading, and I was met at the
trainstation by another longtime correspondant of mine, Joe Mullins from
Ireland (Hi Joe!) who is know working with Nepenthes phylogeny at Reading
and housed my for 2 nights. Though if I remember well, we spent most of
these 2 nights talking about CPs until late. That is, after spending part
of the nights out with a friend of mine who lives in London, Angela
Salmon, sister of Bruce Salmon, our fellow kiwi CPer and Nepenthes
specialist who housed me when I was in New Zealand 2 and 1/2 years ago.
Anyways, at Reading we had the meeting and I showed my slides
again to the British CPers, after a flattering intro by Loyd Wix (Hi
Loyd!), whom I knew from this list. Before and after the meeting, I had a
great time talking with everyone present. I guess what I most loved about
the meeting were the beautiful CPs which had been brought to the meeting
for sale. Stan Lampard's beautiful selection of Mexican Pinguicula in full
bloom most caught my attention.
On Sunday I spent the afternoon visiting the famous Kew Gardens
together with Joe Mullins and Angela Salmon. It wasn't a good time of
year to see the CPs, but I was really impressed with the greenhouses as a
whole. On Monday morning I took a quick look through the Drosera herbarium
collections at Reading. Unfortunately, time was short though, I had to
get to the mainland.
On Tuesday afternoon I arrived at Thomas Carow's (Hi Thomas!),
after having a few problems with trains both in England and Germany.
Thomas grows CPs and sells them all over Germany. His CP collection is
really fantastic (beautiful S.African Drosera, which I'd never seen
live before) and I was also fascinated with all his slides. He's not
only been to most of the interesting CP regions in the world, but he's also
a fantastic photographer. I was delirious with his slides on Mexican
Pings, CPs in S.Africa, CPs in Australia, and even the ones he took when
he came to Brazil 11 years ago. He went to a town called Diamantina in the
state of Minas Gerais, where I've gone CP hunting twice. Amazingly, we
both found Drosera species that the other didn't find. It just makes me
wonder if all other places I've visited in Brazil are just as badly
explored.
One of the most thrilling moments of my stay with Thomas was
probably the sight of a mysterious Drosera which he collected near
Diamantina. He'd sent me a picture of it, but I had never been able to say
for sure what it was. Thomas called it D.sp."golden leaf" and it looked
like a small D.villosa with golden leaves, forming a short column of dead
leaves. If the plant hadn't been in flower, I would've thought it was
probably some form of D.villosa, but the flower scape I saw just threw my
chin right down to the floor! I looked like a new species, but Thomas told
me it had never produced seeds in these past 11 years, so it was most
likely a hybrid. But a hybrid between which species?!? Observing the
giant, hairy flower scapes, I'm almost sure one of the parents is
D.graminifolia "spiralis form" which grows in the Diamantina region and
also has a golden color. But the other parent is still a confusing matter
in my mind. I keep trying to think what species crossed with
D.graminifolia could give those characteristics. Not a simple job since
some characteristics like the giant flower size seem to be a result of
hybrid vigour, while others like the small stipules seem to be a
nullification of very prominent features of the D.graminifolia parent.
Anyways, Thomas' specialty are the animals which thrive on CPs and
I was amazed to learn of the diversity of these adaptations. He's even
discovered new species of arthropods which explore CPs and his slides are
simply magnificent. He's preparing a program on this for German TV, which
will hopefully also have an English translation soon after it's release in
April. One of the things I remember best are the ants which walk calmly
down the internal walls of Nepenthes pitchers and then dive into the
liquid inside to fish out mosquito larvae!! Fantastic! Thomas has
attempted to rear many of these animals in his CP collection and I was
fortunate to see beautiful green spiders walking around on his large
Roridula. I hope I was able to convince Thomas to put some of his slides
on the 'net for all of you to get a taste of his great work.
Time was short though, and I only spent a day with Thomas. He
drove me over to Tuebingen, where I finally met THE Dr.Jan Schlauer, THE
reference for all of our CP literature-related doubts, a true living
library. We were soon joined by Joachim Nertz, one of the members of
the intrepid German CP explorer group, who've travelled several times to
SE Asia in search of rare Neps and even to the tepuis of the Roraima
Highlands, at a time when not many people were going there yet.
I spent 2 fantastic days with Jan and Joachim (Hi to both!),
discussing dozens of taxonomic issues with Jan (mostly regarding
S.American Drosera) and trading field experiences with Joachim. We went
to Joachim's house not far from Tuebingen where I saw his beautiful Neps
and TONS of slides from his trips. I couldn't stop!! We were joined by
Mathias (Hi Mathias, sorry I can't remember, much less spell, your last
name, though I saw you've been leaving a few messages on the 'net
lately) and we later went to his house to see his Neps, when we could
finally pull ourselves away from Joe's immense and amazing slide archive.
My last stop was Mannheim, where I stayed with Andreas Wistuba (Hi
Andreas!), another of the famous German CP explorers. Again I had a ball
seeing slides and more slides of CPs in the wild, specially Andreas'
beautiful shots from Roraima. His Nep + Heliamphora collection was most
amazing and I keep wondering how he manages to maintain it all, including
his vast tissue culture activities! Shelves and shelves of jars with
dozens and dozens of species. I was really surprised to see how all the
Germans seem to be into tissue culture and was happy to see a few jars
containing CPs originated from my seeds.
The German meeting was held near Peter's place in Heidelberg
(Hi Peter, I don't know if you're on the 'net, but sorry I can't
remember how to spell your last name either!) and I was surprised with a
really long and interesting question/answer session after my slide show.
That day, like at the Italian and British CP meetings, I met dozens of
great people, but am already having a hard time trying to put names to
faces, unfortunately. I think I was able to contaminate at least a few
Germans, hopefully British and Italians too, into coming down to Brazil
to see CPs and some of the fantastic landscapes I showed.
One thing with which I really identified with the Germans was
their immense field experience, though their adventures really made mine
seem like a day at kindergarden during summer vacation!! They really have
the adventurous blood in them and I was thrilled to see how much they love
nature. What was most surprising to me though was that on these trips of
theirs to SE Asia, they are often accompanied by their girlfriends! I have
a hard enough time trying to find ANYONE down here willing (and fit) to
follow along on my trips around Brazil, much less girls who are even
slightly thrilled by my CP interests!!! Anyways, I sure hope to be able to
join Andreas, Joachim, and others on future trips of theirs to SE Asia and
hopefully also Roraima. This way I could probably get them to notice more
those smaller CPs which they usually trample in their search for Neps and
Heliamphora, right guys?!
I'd like to thank once again everybody who housed and fed me, who
carried me around, who organized the meetings, and who was present at
these meetings. It was a fantastic experience for me to meet so many of
you CPers. Hope I didn't leave anyone or anything out. I'm still a bit
confused, since I haven't had time to organize myself since I got back.
If I did, please tell me, especially if I'm owing someone a message. I'm
almost sure I left a few messages unanswered when I left for this trips.
Sorry, but I was in total chaos trying to organize this trip, trying to
graduate at university (yes, it's finally over!), and putting together the
last missing pieces for my scholarship to spend the next 2 years in Japan.
So please write to me if you're one of these people and sorry for the
mess.
At the moment I'm feeling really nostalgic, thinking of all of my
new friends, which are unfortunately so far away. At least a few of you
are on the 'net, and e-mail sure makes the world a lot smaller. Thanks
everybody for the great time!!!! A great '96 to all!
Fernando Rivadavia
Sao Paulo, Brazil