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BACPS | Newsletter |
| Winter 2011 |
by Geoff Wong
BACPS 2011 Winter Meeting
Date: Saturday, April 16, 2011
Time: Noon-4:00 p.m.
Place: University of California Botanical Garden, Berkeley
Program: "Carnivorous Plants of Sumatra and Borneo: A Snapshot" by Drew Martinez, Gina Morimoto, and Arthur Yin
Sumatra contains the highest number of Nepenthes species (~37) of any island, and Borneo closely follows (~36). During a recent trip to Sumatra, Drew, Gina, and Arthur observed 27 Nepenthes species, five Nepenthes hybrids, and three Utricularia species. They will show photos of most of these species in their native habitats and share experiences from their trips to Sumatra, Borneo, and Peninsular Malaysia. In addition, Nepenthes conservation issues and other highlights from Borneo and Peninsular Malaysia will be presented.
This will be an opportunity to learn how the plants grow in their natural environment and to get tips on how to cultivate them at home. Drew has constructed special growing chambers, one of which he brought to a meeting a while back. Gina and Arthur, living in the South Bay, will offer tips on growing CP in a part of the Bay Area with more extreme weather conditions.
Please bring plants for the show and tell table. Donations are gratefully appreciated for the raffle and auction, which are our major fundraisers. Members are also welcome to bring plants to sell or auction. A portion of proceeds will be collected as part of our fundraising, 10% for BACPS and 10% for the UC Botanical Garden.
Attendees are encouraged to bring a snack or drink to share. As a token of our appreciation, donors will receive a free raffle ticket.
For directions to the Botanical Garden, visit their website at botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu.
by Doris Quick
BACPS Annual Show and Sale
June 25, 2011
Noon-4 p.m.
Lakeside Park Garden Center, Oakland
It's not too early to be thinking about the show and sale. There will be some copies of the show poster at the next meeting. Be sure to pick a few up to distribute in your area for posting. Good locations include nurseries, libraries, community kiosks, hydroponic or plant supply stores, and any retailer who is willing to post one in their window or on their bulletin board. Be creative.
Do you have a local newspaper or radio station that might give us a blurb? If so, bring the contact information to the meeting so I can send them a press release at the appropriate time.
Start thinking about your entries for judging. Don't be shy. More than once I've left a plant home, convinced that someone else would have a superior one in the show, only to have that person come in with a puny plant due to some cultural problem that year. Even if you don't win, it's still fun to get a chance to show off your plants. The show is more fun for everyone if we have a lot of plants to see. For more information about entering the show and some photos of past shows, visit our show page at bacps.org/show.html.
We have our judges lined up. Barry Rice, Michael Drabinsky, and Damon Collingsworth have agreed to do the job this year.
Our list of vendors is impressive. So far we have: Robert Goleman (Hortus Botanicus), Mitchell Davis, Josh Brown (Predatory Plants), Damon Collingsworth (California Carnivores), Stephen Davis, Lois Ochs (Raccoon Ridge), Margaret and Terry Boomer (Boomer's Orchid Ark), and Mike Wang. If you are interested in getting a table, let me know soon. My email address is: doris_q@pacbell.net.
by Judith Finn
BACPS Meeting Notes, January 15, 2011
Location: San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers
Attendance ~60 people
President Bill Weaver opened the meeting by thanking the San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers for allowing us to meet in their facility. They graciously allowed our members to view their beautiful facilities and their model railroad display, which cleverly combines plants and recycled objects to achieve a magical S.F. landscape through which the trains travel.
Bill reminded us of the annual S.F. Flower and Garden Show where we have displayed our carnivorous plants for several years. This event helps fulfill our mission of promoting CPs to a wider audience. We are located in an area called "Sproutopia" which is geared towards children attending the show. We have a coloring project and little donated flats of plants that we help the children transplant into small pots for them to take home. We decorate our area with beautiful large photos of the various plants, fill a table with donated specimens for people to look at, and exhibit two large models of VFT and Heliamphora that we have borrowed from the S.F. Conservatory of Flowers in the past and that they recently donated to the BACPS.
The April 16 meeting at UC Botanical Garden will highlight Drew, Arthur, and Gina's
trip.
June 25 will be our annual Carnivorous Plant Show at the Lakeside Garden Center in Oakland.
July's meeting will be at California Carnivores in Sebastopol, featuring the 1960's National Geographic article that started many people to collect CPs. Ferdnando Rivadavia will speak about discovering new species in Brazil.
Fernando Rivadavia presented an informative talk on the genus Genlisea in which he combined the latest research with humor and made the information accessible for the whole audience.
In the last 15 years there have been many new discoveries. Pinguicula, Utricularia, and Genlisea
all have different trapping mechanisms. There are 100 species of Pinguicula, 250 of Utricularia,
and 22 species of Genlisea, which contain rosettes of modified leaves, no roots, and "eel traps."
Some species produce traps that grow vertically downwards and also horizontally along the surface.
There is also G. repens whose growth pattern is not a typical rosette, but forms elongated stems.
Genlisea have 5 sepals like Pinguicula, and spurs either point forwards in subgenus
Genlisea (similar to Utricularia) or point backwards in subgenus Tayloria (similar to Pinguicula).
G. pygmaea grows in sandy habitats in Brazil which are seasonally wet. One form has adapted by
developing tubers to overwinter the dry season.
Genlisea have no roots but feature an underground eel trap composed of a single shoot that forks into 2 corkscrews. There are little holes along the edge of the corkscrew arms. With the folds, twists, and hairs pointing inward the prey cannot back out. There does not seem to be any suction involved in leading the prey up the corkscrew arms to the "stomach." These curious plants were first discovered 200 years ago by the French botanist Auguste de Saint-Hilaire in Brazil. Do Genlisea have an attractant, or do prey wander in? In 2003 scientists from the Czech Republic made some important discoveries about mucilage in Genlisea traps possibly helping to keep enzymes from diluting out of the traps. Does digestion occur in the stomach?
Genlisea are common in the savanna/cerrado grasslands of South America and Africa, often in
seasonally wet habitats. Many species are native to Campo Rupestre vegetation on top of sandstone
highlands, where annuals tend to occur in sandy habitats and perennials in peaty substrates. Another
common habitat for Genlisea are Inselbergs and Ferricretes, which are rocky outcrops that dry
out completely for part of the year and usually sustain only annual Genlisea species.
Subgenus Tayloria is native to Brazil and includes the more primitive species, which have seed capsules that open longitudinally. There are 3 species: G. violacea, G. uncinata, and G. lobata, and at least 5 yet unnamed species (but which will hopefully be published by the end of this year).
Subgenus Genlisea includes all remaining species and is divided into 3 sections: Africanae, Recurvatae and Genlisea. The phylogeny of the genus suggests that Genlisea evolved in Brazil, then spread to Africa, and finally returned to the Americas. Birds and/or wind possibly were responsible for this long distance dispersal across the Atlantic -- twice!
Genlisea aurea is a variable species which may end up being divided into several species. The
mucilage on the leaves is believed to protect them from invertebrate predation such as caterpillars, etc.
Genlisea glabra from the tepuis of Venezuela has white-pinkish colored flowers.
G. roraimensis is also located in the tepuis. Genlisea filiformis is a yellow-flowered
annual that extends over a large range from Mexico and Cuba to SE Brazil. Genlisea repens has a
rosetted and a stem-forming form which may represent 2 separate species.
The G. pygmaea complex may also include several undescribed species.
Fernando then gave us a background on DNA research on Genlisea. Genlisea were discovered to have the smallest known plant genomes, with as little as 60 million base pairs (humans have 3.2 billion base pairs per genome). He described how the genome of Genlisea and Utricularia are apparently evolving incredibly fast and discussed some of the speculations that would explain this and the small genome sizes. A gene called Cytochrome C is mutated in a way that allows for quick energy bursts that may aid in prey digestion. But it has a negative side effect of creating excess free radicals which cleave DNA, resulting in the loss of bits and pieces and which may explain the small genome size in Genlisea and Utricularia. How they survive this constant attack on their genomes is not known, but maybe their ability to reproduce vegetatively helps fix the resistant clones.
He ended his talk by speaking of the accidental discovery through DNA sequencing of nitrogen-fixing
bacteria living within the traps of Genlisea, suggesting some kind of commensal relationship
between Genlisea traps and these bacteria.
Lau Hodges of the S.F. Conservatory ended the program by thanking Fernando for his wonderful talk and graciously invited us to have more meetings at the facility.
Mark donated 8 Darlingtonia californica plants, 2 Sarracenia, 3 Pinguicula. Albert Huntington donated a Ceropegia ampliata and several rooted cuttings of Nepenthes alata.
Damon sold various Nepenthes, CP fertilizers, and moss.
Josh Brown sold Nepenthes, Pinguicula and Drosera.
Pinguicula agnata, P. 'Piroutte' hybrid, Drosera multifida, D. capensis, D. bulbosa, D. tubaestylis, Sarracenia hybrid, S. flava atropurpurea, S. oreophila, and Darlingtonia californica.
Damon brought in a Utricularia fulva with 13 inflorescences of beautiful peach-colored flowers. He grows them under lights. He also displayed a 3-year-old impressively large plant of Drosera rupicola 'Golden Green' filled with an abundance of white flowers. Damon also showed a giant Darlingtonia californica 'Lucrezia' with multiple 16" rich red-colored pitchers.
by Charles Siders (age 11)
On February 22, our homeschool botany class took a trip to the UC Berkeley Botanical Gardens. When we were all there we started down to the tropical gardens with a guide. On the way, we walked through the New World Desert and saw these little puff ball cacti. I had touched one at Lowe's -- it was horrible. When we got to the tropical house, the guide showed us a cocoa tree, a Titan Arum, a vanilla plant, a coconut tree, and by the door, a sensitive plant (I had no idea it was there). Then we headed to the carnivores/orchid house. When we got there we saw group two exiting the greenhouse. Inside the CP house we saw a frog -- I'm not sure whether it was alive or not. They had CPs like sundews, bladderworts, and pitfalls. Now we headed to the desert house. They had this big room that only employees could go into. They also had Lithops but they were overgrown. There was also this cactus shaped like a T.
After a picnic lunch we went down to Prof. Chelsea Specht's research lab where graduate student
Tanya Renner showed us how to extract strawberry DNA. First she showed us the DNA double helix
with puzzle pieces. Then we started extracting the strawberry DNA. First we put the strawberry
in a ziplock and crushed it. Then we added 10mL of dish soap, and crushed it some more. Next
we put the strawberry soap mixture in cheese cloth over a test tube to strain out chunks. Now
we had to slowly pour VERY cold rubbing alcohol into the test tube with the strawberry soap mixture.
Then we stirred it with stick and when we pulled the stick out it was covered in DNA. Ms. Renner
also told us about her research on the evolution of carnivorous plants.
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by Gill Wichi
April 2, 2011, we will be hosting our first -- hopefuly of more to come -- South Bay Carnivorous Plant Show and Sale in San Jose. It will be a relaxed and informal atmosphere where you can meet fellow enthusiasts and purchase a few plants for your collection. A small plant show will be held, with talks about CPs, their habits, and how to grow them. We hope that you can make it.
The event will be held April 2 (Saturday) at the Santa Teresa Library at 290 International Circle in South San Jose -- conveniently located close to two highways and mass transit -- and will last from noon until 4:00 p.m. There is no cost to attend, so bring your friends and family to this event.
Hope to see you there!
by Tony Gridley
This year the San Francisco Orchid Society offered us space for an informational booth
at the Pacific Orchid Exposition, held
at Fort Mason in San Francisco on March 3-6. Actually, we shared a booth with another
plant club, the San Francisco Succulent and Cactus Society, which turned out to be a wonderful
group of folks who have amazing and delightful plants.
Before I go any further I need to thank the BACPS volunteers who put in long hours staffing our booth: Doris Quick, Margaret Boomer, Craig Arnold, Will Haines, Katie and Dory Taylor, Gina Morimoto, Arthur Yin, Dexter Hodes, and Paul Bourbin were all fantastic, and I'm very grateful to all of them. Geoff Wong and Marvin Quick provided moral support, Geoff and Bill Weaver provided crucial information about parking, about which I've been hopelessly ignorant my entire life, and Sophie, Doris's dog, provided a surprising number of play toys at a planning meeting. Big thanks also go to Janet Amaro, who finished her way-cool BACPS Show poster in time to give out stacks of them at this event. I would also like to thank the SFOS for their generosity, particularly Dennis Westler, the show chair. And I can't say enough good things about the SFSCS folks with whom we shared the booth, especially booth organizer Daryl Du Charme, club president Helen Lindqvist, and (new BACPS member!) Karen Casino.
It is an interesting challenge to come up with carnivorous plants to display in the first week of March. I tried to look for plants that looked OK in late winter, but also tried to find conversation starters. I brought a small container of mixed aquatics -- Utricularia humboldtii, U. gibba, Aldrovanda vesiculosa, and Genlisea violacea -- because they're not so well known to the general public, and I like talking about them. The issue of near-extinction in the wild was represented by Drosera regia. All kinds of issues can be illustrated by a big pot of mixed weeds labeled "Albion Bog," which may or may not be the result of taking a small clump of dirt from that place and planting it at home. I know my rights under the Constitution and won't say anything more except that when I enter this pot in the show I'll call it Mixed Media Garden #4 because Barry Rice is one of the judges and I want to win a ribbon.
In any event, the show was marvellous, and I hope we were able to contribute something to its success. Here are a few totally gratuitous photos of some of the orchids.
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by Joe Mazrimas
| BACPS TREASURY REPORT January 15, 2011 | |||
| ASSETS | DEBIT | BALANCE | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Raffle | $24.00 | ||
| Auction | $51.00 | ||
| Sellers | $70.00 | ||
| TOTAL | $145.00 | ||
| O-EBGC, Inc | $50.00 | ||
| Current Balance (01-15-2011) | $95.00 | ||
| Previous Balance (10-30-2010) | $6663.30 | ||
| TOTAL | $6758.30 |
April 2, 2011: South Bay Carnivorous Plant Show and Sale, Noon-4:00 p.m.,
Santa Teresa Library, 290 International Circle, San Jose.
April 16, 2011: Spring Meeting. Program: "CP of Sumatra and Borneo." Speakers:
Drew Martinez, Gina Morimoto, and Arthur Yin;
University of California Botanical Garden, Berkeley.
June 25, 2011: Annual Show and Sale, Lakeside Park Garden Center, Oakland.
July 23, 2011: Potluck and presentation, California Carnivores, Sebastopol.
October 15, 2011: Fall Meeting. "Darlingtonia in Northern California and Southern Oregon," Damon Collingsworth;
University of California Botanical Garden, Berkeley.
January 21, 2012: Winter Meeting. "Carnivorous Plants of Africa," Fernando Rivadavia; Conservatory of Flowers, San Francisco.
2011 BACPS Show poster -- Janet Amaro; UC Berkeley field trip photos -- Jenny Siders; other photos -- Tony Gridley
The BACPS Newsletter is a quarterly publication produced by the Bay Area Carnivorous Plant Society. Please send newsletter submissions to Tony Gridley (tgridley@comcast.net). For more information on membership, subscriptions, or events, please visit our website: www.bacps.org.
