Q: Drosera indica complex

Drosera indica complex1
D. aquatica2 D. aurantiaca2 D. barrettiorum2 D. cucullata2 D. finlaysoniana3 D. fragrans2	D. glabriscapa2 D. hartmeyerorum2 D. indica4 D. nana2 D. serpens3
1All these plants are in section Arachnopus. 2Australia. 3Australia and Asia. 4Asia and Africa.

A: The lead plant in this group, Drosera indica, ironically is one of the most atypical in that it has a wide range, but that does not include Australia. Most of the other species are confined to Australia.

The species can be distinguished by flower color, the presence or absence of petioles, and the details of the hairs--which are glandular, how long they are, and where they are located. Also, some of these plants produce bizarre, yellow multicellular growths on short stalks on the leaves. The nature or function of these little yellow structures are matters of much debate.

To key these plants out, refer to the original publications--there are too many details to reproduce here. A few nerdy details about the plants follow.

Drosera aurantiaca
This plant bears orange flowers, and has sessile red leaf lamina with both long (red) and short (white) glandular trichomes.

Drosera barrettiorum
The plant bears weird, yellow disc-like structures on short filaments on the leaves.

Drosera cucullata
This species bears tiny, red eglandular clavate trichomes.

Drosera finlaysoniana
The leaf surface is very strongly concave.

Drosera fragrans
This plant has tiny scrotiform (hee hee) axillary appendages, and T-shaped eglandular appendages.

Drosera hartmeyerorum
This has the most complicated, weird yellow stalked structures of the group--they look like a bunch of grapes merged together.

Drosera serpens
This plant bears scattered, tiny, Y-shaped hairs.

Page citations: Fleischmann, A. & Lee, C.C. 2009; Fleischmann, A. et al. 2011; Lowrie, A. 1999, 2013; Lowrie, A., and Conran, J.G. 2014; Lowrie, A. et al. 2017a, 2017b; Rice, B.A. 2006a; Robinson, A. et al. 2017;Salmon, B. 2001; Schlauer, J. 1996, 2002;