VFTNoob wrote:That tasmanian devil is not worth what he's charging. He's got a cultivar called Orca that looks very similar to whale.
Agreed. If you want to grow your own CCCP Tasmanian Devil, just self-pollinate a Coquillage. A lot of the seedlings look like the parent plant, which is what CCCP Tasmanian Devil looks like to me. I'll reserve full judgment though because I've not personally grown it. But from all the photos I've seen, it looks a lot like Coquillage and identical to many of the Coquillage x Coquillage seedlings I grew a number of times I made that cross. In the official cultivar description I suppose the distinction is the "unique wavy trap morphology" but that happens with Coquillage sometimes as well, particularly when it is right out of TC like all the photos I have seen of CCCP Tasmanian Devil. The wavy traps also occur very often with the seedlings of Coquillage but never struck me as something different enough to warrant cultivar designation.
VFTNoob wrote:He also never produces an adult specimen of plants when I ask. I think he's just burning n churning seedgrown/tc plants.
He does seem to be in a bit of a "rush" with rolling out clones and offering plants right out of TC and registering new clones without really fully evaluating them before doing so. I've seen several red flytraps he's named that look completely unremarkable to me outside of the fact they are red-leafed flytraps. But if you self-pollinate a red flytrap or cross two red flytraps, about 2/3 of the resulting seed set germinates as red baby flytraps. Should each and every one have a name?
I know I'm being a little critical and overall it really is a great thing for the hobby that he's able to offer so many plants to people who want them, particularly those he's cloning. But I think naming every seed grown that is atypical in its appearance creates a bit of a mess in the cultivar system. I've been at this a while now, over 13 years, and this is the first time I've seen so many newly named flytrap cultivars introduced in such a short period of time from a single grower. Of course, there's the other side of the discussion that the more plants that are out there, the merrier! But it seems many people are just overwhelmed by the number of named flytraps and most people, even moderately experienced collectors, would have a very hard time identifying a named plant that wasn't labeled. I think we should save naming flytraps for ones that are really special but that's just one person's opinion, of course! Obviously, I can't be too harsh because there are a few flytraps I've named that I wish I could take back now
DeadlyCarnivore wrote:How does that work? It can just grow out of its trait and become a normal flytrap again? Thats pretty interesting....
Yeah, I don't know why exactly but there are quite a few named cultivars out there, some of which are registered too, that seemingly grow well and produce odd traps for a year or two or perhaps several then revert to a typical looking flytrap most of the time after some time in cultivation. They'll still occasionally put out odd growth but most traps look 100% normal.
I have a theory but certainly have no data to back it (or minimal data) --- I believe quite a few people who do TC use pretty strong hormones and it can create some abnormal growth. Some plants have the genetics to make these abnormal traps and some of the cytokinins or auxins (plant hormones commonly used in TC) are known to create odd-looking growth. Sometimes it can take years for flytraps to grow out of it. Sometimes they never do if high enough levels of hormones are used! That's why I use very minimal hormones for flytrap propagation in TC and I put them through several replating processes where no hormones are used that take about 1 year before deflasking them and putting them in soil. If that isn't done, it's really hard to know what you'll actually get in terms of growth once the hormones finally wear off.
hungrycarnivores wrote:The deal with mutations is that they're often epigenetic or hormonal (don't depend on genes, but rather things that regulate genes). Mutants will have epigenetic triggers that change DNA activation (methylation slows transcription and thus translation, and histone acetylation increases transcription). Through some combo of these two, and hormone factors (florigens, auxins (root and shoot), cytokinins (pointing), you get strange things like mirror. Some plants can flower very strongly since the gene encoding florigens is acetylated. Or you can get multiple traps from overabundances of hormone factors (epigenetically controlled). Really interesting stuff.
I'm not an expert, so to learn more, read about Plant Immunology, Plant Endocrinology, and Epigenetics.
@hungrycarnivores, very interesting. That would somewhat align with my theory above, right?
Adrien wrote:On Craigs recent FB posts he is making sure to add that his plants are TC’ed through Leaf pulling and are in fact clones. That’s a good thing and his plants should be legit.
That's excellent news! I wish he'd just lose the TTN designation though. It is meaningless and extremely confusing. If they're propagated in TC through leaf pullings, then there's no need to add any acronym or description because they're propagated vegetatively and thus are exact clones so he can just use the name.
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