Sarracenia Endangered Species Seed Collection - 2016

Sarracenia Endangered Species Seed Collection - 2016

From Left to Right: Sarracenia flava (the 4 tall pitchers), S. oreophila (the small pitcher toward the bottom, Sarracenia rubra subsp. alabamensis (practically brown and all but died back for the winter) growing in glass containers within a bucket.

Sarracenia rubra subsp. alabamensis flower stem. Behind the one I am holding is a green flower bud and stem that is from S. oreophila.

March 2016 I purchased one of each Sarracenia oreophila, Sarracenia rubra subsp. alabamensis, and Sarracenia rubra ssp. jonesii rhizomes/roots from Meadowview Biological Research Station in Woodford, VA. They have the only USFWS permit to sell growing plants of these endangered species. These are federally listed Endangered Plant Species.

I obtained 506 seeds from this plant. Self-pollinated Sarracenia rubra subsp. alabamensis, a federally endangered plant.

 A few months later, plants bloomed. I put my plants in different windows, some on different floors of my house. Most windows have curtains that would close the plants between window and curtain. Paint brushes are cheap and I bought a pack of 20 or so assorted brushes of different sizes. These were simple paint brushes, the type children use for water colors. I selected the softer smaller thread brushes for efficiency in gathering pollen and pollinating. I took a single brush, gathered pollen that fell into the base of the Sarracenia flower “cup,” brushed the 5 stigmas with the pollen brush. Then I stuck the brush into the flower pot to redo the process later. Paint brushes were kept with the single pot, single species. I pollinated the flowers for a month on consecutive days, sometimes skipping a day or weekend, basically whenever I remembered and walked by the plants. Easily I performed this task 10 times throughout flowering. I repeated the pollinating in case the stigma or pollen were not active on one day, maybe they would be active on the next. Brushes were kept with their pot/species. I did not cross pollinate. This wasn’t by design and I didn’t care about hybrids. This was just how it was done. I didn’t really expect to get results, definitely not this many seeds.

Months later capsules formed, developed, and in September 2016 were harvested. The capsules were opened and seeds counted.

Sarracenia oreophila pitchers and flowers.

Sarracenia rubra subsp. alabamensis

It had 2 flowers. I pollinated the flowers. I didn’t notice the seed capsule were mature until I touched one and seeds sprinkled out. I then took action to try to collect the seeds. From 1 full capsule and maybe 65-90% of the other capsule, I collected 506 seeds.

Sarracenia rubra ssp. jonesii

This plant did bloom, but didn’t turn out so well. I blame my care for this. It could have been in a better location.

Sarracenia Oreophila had 2 flowers. It formed 2 pods.

Capsule 1: 702 seeds of a brown/tan color.

Capsule 2: 687 seeds of a purple color.

Total 1389 seeds. That is an average of 694.5 seeds per capsule.

 

Sarracenia oreophila flowers

 

 

702 seeds from a single Sarracenia oreophila seed capsule.

 From capsule 2, I was able to separate a single compartment of the 5 compartment capsuled flowers. It contained 153 seeds. A fifth of 687 is 137.4, so seeds per compartment can vary. This may be due to pollinating. A Sarracenia flower has 5 stigmas (female part). I took efforts to pollinate each stigma. Perhaps I succeeded better with some stigmas more than others.

When examining the seeds of the Sarracenia oreophila, I noticed the capsules had seeds of different colors; rather one capsule had brown/tan seeds and the other purple. This color difference could be due to many factors: nutrition for that flower, sunlight on the flower, maturity and development of the flower, air exposure, you name it. If for some extravagant reason I mixed brushes which I did not, I did not pollinate just one flower with a brush and the other with a different brush. I was lazy and pollinated the flowers with the same brush. Also the seeds were the same color throughout the capsule, not multi-colored within.

Sarracenia oreophila seeds from the same plant, but different seed capsules. Note the different colors!