''Nepenthes lavicola'' (; from

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

: ''lavicola'' growing upon lava) is a tropical pitcher plant species

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...

to the Geureudong Massif of

Aceh Aceh ( ), officially the Aceh Province ( ace, Nanggroë Acèh; id, Provinsi Aceh) is the westernmost province of Indonesia. It is located on the northernmost of Sumatra island, with Banda Aceh being its capital and largest city. Granted a ...

, northern

Sumatra Sumatra is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the sixth-largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 (182,812 mi.2), not including adjacent i ...

, where it grows at 2000–2600 m

above sea level Height above mean sea level is a measure of the vertical distance ( height, elevation or altitude) of a location in reference to a historic mean sea level taken as a vertical datum. In geodesy, it is formalized as '' orthometric heights''. Th ...

. It is thought to be most closely related to '' N. singalana'' and '' N. spectabilis''. ''Nepenthes lavicola'' is notable for its very prominent

bract In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, especially one associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis or cone scale. Bracts are usually different from foliage leaves. They may be smaller, larger, or o ...

s, which often overarch the flowers and may be up to 7 cm long at the base of female

inflorescence An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are forme ...

s. This species is also unusual in that it bears up to two bracts per pedicel or partial peduncle.

Swiss Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland *Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri *Swiss, North Carolina * Swiss, West Virginia *Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses * Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports * Swiss Internation ...

botanist Albert Friedrich Frey-Wyssling mentioned ''N. lavicola'' in a 1931 article as an unidentified ''Nepenthes'' species.Frey-Wyssling, A. 1931. Over de vegetatie van den Boer ni Telong en omstreken in de Gajolanden (Noord Sumatra). ''De Tropische Natuur'' 20: 37–49.

''Nepenthes lavicola'' has no known

natural hybrid In biology, a hybrid is the offspring resulting from combining the qualities of two organisms of different breeds, varieties, species or genera through sexual reproduction. Hybrids are not always intermediates between their parents (such as in ...

s.McPherson, S.R. 2009. '' Pitcher Plants of the Old World''. 2 volumes. Redfern Natural History Productions, Poole. No forms or varieties have been described.

References

'' 1998(2): 36–37.
p. 2
* Meimberg, H., A. Wistuba, P. Dittrich & G. Heubl 2001. Molecular phylogeny of Nepenthaceae based on cladistic analysis of plastid trnK intron sequence data. ''Plant Biology'' 3(2): 164–175. * Meimberg, H. 2002. PhD thesis, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Munich. * Meimberg, H. & G. Heubl 2006. Introduction of a nuclear marker for phylogenetic analysis of Nepenthaceae. ''Plant Biology'' 8(6): 831–840. * Meimberg, H., S. Thalhammer, A. Brachmann & G. Heubl 2006. Comparative analysis of a translocated copy of the ''trnK'' intron in carnivorous family Nepenthaceae. ''Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution'' 39(2): 478–490. {{Taxonbar, from=Q5487985 Carnivorous plants of Asia lavicola Endemic flora of Sumatra Critically endangered flora of Asia Plants described in 1996

References

Further reading