Drosera regia
Drosera regia
The king sundew (Drosera regia) is a carnivorous plant in the genus Sundew ( Drosera ). The nature in the very rare species is found only in a small area in South Africa.
Description
When the king sundew is one of the largest species of sundew. It is an upright style with herbaceous growth and many vigorous adventitious roots that grow from a short rhizome.
The leaf buds are, unusually, not rolled inward but outward. The sessile, linealischen leaves are up to 40 centimeters long and 12 millimeters wide and taper up to the thread-like tip. They have a significantly protruding downward midrib and are busy at their top as well as at the edge of the blade attachment with long, knob-like tentacles to catch prey, the lower leaf surface itself is smooth.
Flowering period is January. The inflorescence is up to 40 cm high, cylindrical and glabrous. The bracts are small and carry some reduced tentacles. The flower stems are up to 15 millimeters long and also occupied with reduced tentacles.
The flowers are large for the genus. The intergrown sepals are up to 13 mm long, densely covered with reduced tentacles of the edge are long-stalked. The white or dusky pink petals are obovate and about 2.5 inches long. The stamens are 15 millimeters long, the stamens cylindrical, the dust bag pike -shaped at the base, tapering towards the tip. The undivided pen are 13 millimeters long, slender trumpet-shaped to the upper end, occupied the scar with glandular hairs. The obround capsule is up to 8 mm long, the seeds are just one millimeter long, netted at the surface and spindle-shaped.
Dissemination
The king sundew is a Lokalendemit, he is only native to South Africa in a single valley at Baineskloof Pass the Western Cape Province, some 120 kilometers north of Cape Town. There you find the type of sand and peat soils in low grasslands ..
The species is extremely rare in natura and threatened with extinction.
Systematics / Evolution
The King Sundew applies with its closest relatives, the Australian Drosera arcturi than the basalste Sonnentauart.
It was first described in 1926 by Edith Layard Stephens. His stature and the pollen shape that sets it apart from all other species of the genus, has led to its classification into a separate subgenus Regiae. Chrtek and Slavikova classified him in 1996, even in its own genus as a Freatulina regia, this view but is not commonly followed.