Bulletin of the American Rock Garden Society Volume 50 Number 1 Winter 1992 Cover: Sarracenia hybrid "Queen of Hearts" by Rob Proctor of Denver, Colorado Bulletin of the American Rock Garden Society Volume 50 Number 1 Winter 1992 Features Hybrid Pitcher Plants, by Lawrence Mellichamp 3 A Sphagnum Bog Garden, by Roberta Case 11 Miniature Waterlilies, by Stephen Doonan and Phil Pearson 13 Harbinger of Spring, by Judy Glattstein 16 Building a Waterfall, by Ray Radebaugh 21 Bog Gardens and Bog Plants, by Frederick W. Case, Jr. 45 A Woodland Waterfall and Pool, by Judith Jones 47 Miniature Water Gardens, by Joseph V. Tomocik 50 Rock Gardening in Ontario, by Barrie Porteous 51 Departments Plant Portrait 58 Books 59 Propagation 65 Sarracenia x catesbaei x Sarracenia alata 2 Bulletin of the American Rock Garden Society Vol. 50(1) Hybrid Pitcher Plants by Lawrence Mellichamp I collected my first pitcher plant in people have water gardens, in shade or 1968 in the coastal flat woods and pine sun; but the bog garden, which requires savannas of southeastern North Caroli• full sun and just the right level of mois• na. Sarracenias grew commonly in ture, remains a challenge. these habitats characterized by moist, Possibly, too, bog gardening reminds highly organic, nutrient-poor soils and me of my first encounter with the beau• frequent fires that kept dense vegeta• tiful but fragile habitats that are so rich tion from forming. Sundews, bladder- in species, without the pesky insects of worts, butterworts, and the world- the wild. famous Venus'-flytrap also grew in I can't deny, also, that a reason for abundance, before the massive land- growing bog plants is they always elicit drainage activities of the 1970s which a response of excitement, or awe, from left much of the terrain dry pine planta• visitors. Although different from the joy tions. North Carolina has more differ• of seeing a lotus or waterlily in bloom, ent genera of carnivorous plants than bog plants are very gratifying in their any other place in the world, and many abnormal behavior. of the species make interesting speci• The genus Sarracenia (named after mens for the home bog garden. 18th century Canadian botanist and My favorites have been the pitcher physician Dr. Michel Sarrazin) contains plants. I still have growing a piece of 11 species, all but one of which are the original one I collected over 20 endemic to the southeastern United years ago. The other carnivorous plants States. That one, Sarracenia seem to come and go for me in cultiva• purpurea, is remarkable in having tion, acting as annuals or short-lived spread during the 10,000 years since perennials. Perhaps they are just more glaciation to the Gulf Coast and north• particular about their growing condi• ward all the way west across Canada in tions. Nevertheless, I enjoy working peat bogs and on wet lake shores. It with sarracenias and other bog species also seems to flourish as an introduced because they seem to represent a plant in northern European bogs. neglected area of gardening. Many There is one close Sarracenia relative, 3 Darlingtonia californica, restricted to studied and described most of the natu• cool mountain streams and bogs in ral hybrids between pairs of species that northwestern California and adjacent grew together in the wild throughout the Oregon. Darlingtonia is difficult to Southeast. The genus was mono• grow in our hot southeastern summers graphed by Sidney McDaniel in 1971. and is not considered in this article. ("The Genus Sarracenia," Bulletin of Some growers may keep it alive, but I the Tall Timbers Research Station, have never seen plants grown well Tallahassee, 9:1-36.) In recent years, outside its native region. There are also Fred and Roberta Case have recognized distant relatives in southeastern two new distinct taxa from Alabama, Venezuela, in the genus Heliamphora, Sarracenia alabamensis (photo, p. 41) known as sun or marsh pitchers. Since and S. alabamensis ssp. wherryi. In they are not hardy, they will not be addition, distinct forms have long been described here. known and cultivated, though not Most of the natural species of formally named, such as the giant form Sarracenia are well known as horticul• of S. minor from the Okefenokee tural subjects, having been highly Swamp in southeastern Georgia (photo, regarded in England and Europe since p. 43), a pink-flowered form of S. the Victorian era of the late 19th centu• purpurea from Mobile, and various albi• ry. The often-cited treatment by John no forms of most red-flowered species. MacFarlane in L.H. Bailey's Cyclope• Probably the most generally acknowl• dia of Horticulture (1914) is still edged natural hybrid is S. x catesbaei required reading for anyone interested (photo, p. 43), a cross between S. in pitcher plants. flaua and S. purpurea. Wherever they I am especially proud of the fact that grow together, the hybrid may be found. an ancestor of mine, a Dr. Joseph H. Another common hybrid along the Gulf Mellichamp, who lived in the Bluffton Coast is S. x mitchelliana (S. leuco- area of southeastern South Carolina, phylla x S. purpurea). Both can be collected and studied pitcher plants in robust growers. Our research efforts the latter half of the 19th century. He now are to acquire—from the wild or published several scholarly papers man-made—specimens of every possi• describing his observations of Sarrace• ble cross between pairs of species. nia minor (photo, p. 44), and he is Sarracenias produce large, bee-polli• attributed with proving that sarracenias nated flowers in spring. There is one catch and digest insects, i.e., that they nodding flower per stalk, and usually are truly insectivorous. Even Charles one stalk per growing lead (or "toe"). Darwin, who wrote the first book on Some smell sweet, others smell musty. insectivorous plants, never realized that A given individual plant blooms for sarracenias were carnivorous! about a week and the flowers are very One unusual trait of these species is showy, but it is the long-lasting pitchers that they hybridize freely among them• that make these plants famous and that selves, like tropical orchids, and the are mostly used to tell the different hybrids are fertile and capable of cross• species apart. Lately, individual pitchers ing with each other and back-crossing to of wild-collected S. leucophylla the species, often resulting in fantastic (photo, p. 41) are being sold in florist natural hybrid swarms in disturbed habi• shops as "cut flowers." All pitchers tats along the Gulf Coast. During the have hoods (mostly to keep out rain early 1950s, Ritchie Bell of North water), various hairs within the tubular Carolina and Fred Case of Michigan pitcher leaves (to keep prey from 4 Bulletin of the American Rock Garden Society Vol. 50(1) escaping), and no moving parts to ing Co., Winston-Salem, NC), or catch insects. They are passive pitfall consult back issues of the Carnivorous traps. As in all carnivorous plants, it is Plant Newsletter, an excellent quarter• the leaf that is modified to catch prey. ly guide to growing and understanding The pitchers will attract any number of all carnivorous plants, now in its 19th bees, moths, ants, flies, and wasps by year of publication (available from CPN, the sweet, sticky nectar secretions Biology Dept., California State Univer• around the mouth of the pitcher. The sity, Fullerton, CA 92634). insects slip into the tubes, can't get out, While the species are fairly easy to fall to the bottom and die, are digested grow, I feel that often they do not make by enzymes, and provide nutrients that the best ornamental plants because of are absorbed by the leaf to supplement their seasonal pitcher production, their their soil-based nutrition. We often use occasional dislike of all but the best cotton balls to keep moths out of the conditions of sun, soil, and water, and pitchers in the fall as they tend to over- the difficulty in obtaining propagated accumulate and "gum up" the pitchers (as opposed to wild-collected) speci• —as if a person tried to eat an mens. Hybrids are easier to maintain unplucked chicken. than species. All pitcher plants are very The species of pitcher plants are interesting and clearly intriguing to even described in Table 1, where brief distin• the most casual observer. Only the guishing features are given. Rowers are famous Venus'-flytrap ranks higher in either red or yellow; the pitchers are tall interest and that's because the trap or short and of various colors (influ• moves. Yet pitcher plants are larger, enced by the amount of sunlight); and more colorful, easier to grow, and more unless otherwise noted, the distributions readily propagated by division, and thus refer to the coastal plain region of the should be more widely known. In various states. The seasonal production response to an increasing interest in of pitchers can be distinctive: new pitcher plants on the part of the gener• pitchers may be produced starting in al public and based on comments from earliest spring and continuing until visitors to the University of North frost, or. there may be periods of no Carolina at Charlotte Botanical apparent growth. For example, some Gardens, where we have hundreds of species make new pitchers in spring specimens on display, I decided to only; others will have growing spurts in begin breeding man-made hybrids of spring and then again in late summer Sarracenia for ultimate distribution to or fall. Normally, fall pitchers are larger the horticulture trade. Only a few prop• and more colorful. Three species [S. agated species and hybrids are available fiaua (photo, p.