Description
Purple Pitcher Plant – Sarracenia purpurea var. venosa – Carnivorous Plant
Sarracenia purpurea var. venosa is a hardy variety of the Sarracenia purpurea species, commonly known as the Northern Purple Pitcher Plant or Broadleaf Purple Pitcher Plant. It’s a type of carnivorous plant native to the eastern United States and parts of Canada.
It’s pitchers are short, squat, and wide-mouthed with reddish-green to deep purple coloration. It is distinctively hairy (more so than S. purpurea var. purpurea), giving it a “velvety” look and this helps differentiate it from the northern variety. It has prominent, net-like veins on the pitchers giving it the name venosa (“veiny”).
The Purple Pitcher Plant grows a rosette of pitchers close to the ground and tends to grow slowly and compactly and produces large, nodding, deep reddish-purple flowers on tall stalks in the spring.
The pitchers collect rainwater and attract insects with nectar which Insects then fall into the water-filled pitcher and are digested by mutualistic bacteria and enzyme. This is a nutrient source for the plant, especially in poor, acidic soils.
The Purple Pitcher Plants natural habitat are Bogs, fens, wet meadows and thrives in nutrient-poor, acidic, and moist environments.
Full sun is ideal (6–8 hours/day) and water only with distilled, rain, or reverse osmosis water. Keep grow medium consistently wet; do not allow to dry out.
For growth medium Use a mix of sphagnum peat moss and perlite/sand (no fertilizer).
Plant sizes vary batch to batch, see photos for size differences.
