tuberous-drosera.net --- Drosera hirsuta

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Drosera hirsuta

D. hirsuta is one of the species in the macrantha complex consisting of D. eremaea, D. hirsuta, D. indumenta, D. macrantha and D. planchonii. It is a climbing species reaching 45 to 60 cm in length. The typical feature of this species is its glandular lower stem section and the densely hirsute uppermost stem section. The flowers are usually white but a pink flowered form is also known.

The tubers of this species are white and smooth according to Lowrie, but I usually find wart-like structures on their surface, including those tubers directly obtained from Allen. Therefore I am not sure how solid this criterion is. Please check out the pictures below in that respect.

A short summary of typical features within the macrantha complex:
D. eremaea: scattered minute glands on the stem, tuber white and smooth, seeds have a spear-like apex
D. hirsuta: glabrous stem, upper part densely hirsute (=covered with non-glandular hairs), tuber white and smooth, seeds have a wide, one-sided wing
D. indumenta: stem covered with hairs along its full length, tuber white and warty, seeds have a narrow one-sided wing
D. macrantha: lower stem section glabrous, upper section glandular, tuber white and warty, seeds have a wide, spear-like apex
D. planchonii: lower stem section glabrous, upper section sparsely glandular, tuber white and warty, seeds with a narrow, longitudinal, one-sided ledge a wide, paddle-like apex

Allen Lowrie offered D. hirsuta as D. aff. macrantha Northern Heathland Form in the past.


Tubers of D. hirsuta Whereas Drosera macrantha often readily produces additional daugther tubers, my D. hirsuta very rarely do so. Within 8 seasons I found a total of 1 additional tuber and even that one may be the result of a damaged stolon. The shrinkled black material on next to the Northern Heathland form tuber are the remains from the previous season's tuber. Allen Lowrie describes the tubers to be smooth but often I find them to be warty.



Lower stem section Drosera hirsuta has a mostly glabrous stem, only the uppermost part is densely covered with colourless or red, non-glandular hairs.



A litte bit more detail on the development during the season: Drosera hirsuta emerges with mostly glabrous stem and keeps growing like this for roughly the first month. Then the uppermost part will become more and more hairy. These pictures were taken in the second half of November.




Approximately one month later, the plant has adapted a more scrambling growth form - probably due to the lack of some support - and red hairs are now densely covering the newly developing plant parts whereas the middle stem section is covered with few, but increasing number of hairs. The lower stem section remains glabrous. These pictures show the same plant and were taken during mid to end of December.


Flowers The form with red hairs on the uppermost part is pale pink flowered while the form with colourless hairs is white flowered.

Please respect that all texts and photos were created by me and may not be used without my permission.