Nepenthes gracilis
This is usually a prostrate-stemmed plant, though it can occasionally climb to about 2 meters. The lower pitcher, 3. 5-7. 5 cm long, is light green with dark red spotting, with a light green rim and dark red lid, while the upper pitcher is 5-15 cm long, dark mahogany red or reddish brown, with a similarly-coloured or dark red lid, and a green to reddish-brown rim. In contrast, the interior is almost white or pinkish-white. It is found in the open, often in sunny places amongst herbs, occurring in Borneo, Sumatra, Malaysia and Celebes.
Nepenthes rafflesiana
The pitchers have a distinctive form, as shown in the accompanying pictures. The teeth of the rim are rather sharp and conspicuous and the rim differs from those of other species in that it widens markedly at its upper end, just below the lid. The lid has two keels and the spur is unbranched. The lower pitcher is 7. 5-25. 5 cm long and has rather prominent wings, the edges of which bend inwards towards one another, and are fringed with long hairs. The upper pitcher is 7. 5-30 cm long. The background colour of the outside of the tube, lid and rim of both upper and lower pitchers is usually cream to pale green, and the pitcher is beautifully marked with chocolate, garnet or dark red, the same colour being irregularly striped on the ribs of the rim. The species grows up to 9 meters high in nature and is found at the edge of forest or on sunny banks in both wet and dry ground. It is native to Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo. Nepenthes ampullaria
This species is peculiar in producing, in addition to the climbing stem, ground-level rosettes of small leaves which are white to pink, and may be less than 5 cm long. There may be many sprouting from underground rhizomes around a single climbing stem, and each is surrounded by several terrestrial pitchers springing from the ground; an equally unique feature. They are tub-like, round-bottomed and very short, 3. 5-5 cm) long, some being scarcely deeper than wide, and there are two fringed wings. The mouth is oval to nearly round and almost horizontal, and the lip formed by the rim is unusually narrow, as the inner part of the rim descends the interior of the mouth almost vertically. The lid is two-keeled and remarkably narrow, being less than 3 mm wide. Almost identical but somewhat longer pitchers are produced on the lowermost leaves of the climbing stem, hanging down to rest on the ground, but aerial pitchers are apparently never found. The terrestrial pitcher varies from light to yellow-green, and is usually blotched with red or purple, while the ground pitcher is usually entirely green. The species grows up to 9 meters in the wild, and is found in wet forests and peaty places in Malaya, Borneo, New Guinea, Sumatra and Singapore. Nepenthes x hookeriana
Where N. rafflesiana and N. ampullaria grow within a short distance of one another, as they do in Borneo, Sumatra and Malaysia, this natural hybrid between the two species very often occurs. The characteristics of the pitcher are generally about midway between the two parents. The influence of N. ampullaria is seen in the widely elliptical entrance with its broad rim, while the general form of the pitcher brings N. rafflesiana more to mind. The pitcher is light green with reddish blotches, while the rim is usually green.
Nepenthes bicalcarata
The pitchers of this species possess two very curious sharp thorn-like structures just under the lid of the pitcher. Their use seems far from clear, but in 1880 F. W. Burbidge expressed the belief that they served to discourage the attentions of a small insect-eating lemur, Tarsius spectrum, which he had found freely raiding the pitchers of N. rafflesiana, but in the case of N. bicalcarata '. . . the Tarsius is certainly held and pierced when he inserts his head to see what there is in the pitcher.'
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The lower pitchers are 6.5-10 cm high, tub-shaped, the bottoms rounded, and there are two fringed wings. The mouth is round. The inner part of the rim is rather wide and almost flat, and is inclined rather steeply into the pitcher. Its ends, immediately under the base of the lid, terminate in the two curved thorns referred to above, and which have evolved from a number of ribs. The lid is kidney-shaped, and the spur is quite long, thick and blunt. The upper pitchers are 5-13 cm long, funnel or bell-shaped, with two pronounced ribs replacing the wings, but in other details they are similar to the lower pitchers. The outside of the pitcher and both surfaces of the lid may vary from pale to mid-green, suffused with rustred to pure rust, while the rim is green.
This species may grow to 14 meters in height, and occurs in swampy forests in Borneo.
By Dr Jacqueline Henrot
Ref: "Carnivorous plants, A. Slak, 1979, Alphabooks, Sherborne, Dorset"
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