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Sarracenia flava var. atropurpurea F-134-MK
21st May 2014
Cooks Bayou, Florida.
A fascinating plant, wild collected in Cooks Bayou, Florida (I'm not sure who collected it).
Deep purple pitchers typical of a good form of S.f. atropurpurea. Established wisdom would say that the pink colour of the petals is a consequence of hybridity, which is quite possible. Coastal Florida is densely populated and alien species of Sarracenia have been added to a number of bog systems through human intervention. The yellow stripes just visible in the back petals are commonly found in hybrids of S.rubra, so some involvement of S. rubra gulfensis is quite possible.
On the other hand, it is also possible that the high levels of anthocyanin pigments in the rest of the plant 'spill over' into the petals in some plants. Red marks on the sepals are quite common in plants from Florida and red speckles on the petals also occur. It may be that we have to accept that S. flava can have red pigmented flowers on rare occasions.
