- First described
- 2025
- Into cultivation
- 2023
- Type
- single accession mislabeled blanchetii purchase
Origin (and identity uncertainty)
Mike's plant came to him through an identity mistake. He had been chasing U. blanchetii, ordered two pots from different vendors after the first was nearly dead/moss-overrun, and after roughly two years of patient salvage work both pots eventually thrived and flowered. At that point, neither was the blanchetii he expected — both were U. parthenopipes. A pleasant surprise: parthenopipes was also on his wishlist.
The species ID is itself contested. hcarlton (forum) raised the question: what's traded as parthenopipes may actually be a white-flowered blanchetii, possibly a synonym, or possibly intermediate forms within a continuum. Mike's response: most growers and botanists globally are calling it parthenopipes (multiple European/global vendor pages cited). hcarlton later found a CPUK thread suggesting the white plants represent what was described as parthenopipes but the species may end up synonymized with blanchetii.
Standout traits
- Heavy bloomer once the colony establishes.
- Strongly variable flower form (Mike: "petals a lot wider than the others, maybe genetics?").
- Outdoor-tolerant in NorCal under shade cloth + warm-substrate microsite.
Cultivation framework
- Start seeds warm + grow-lights indoors.
- Move outdoors only after divisions are robust.
- Soil-warm microsite (cement-warmed) preserves outdoor viability through cold nights.
- Doesn't self-set seed under Mike's conditions — non-invasive.
Standout traits
- Long-blooming — flowers form for an extended period and pack many blooms even into a 2" pot.
- Acclimates well outdoors after starting indoors under grow lights.
- Vigor scales with colony density: small colonies still bloom, but profuse blooming follows pot fill-up.
- Identity-uncertain: hcarlton flags ongoing taxonomic question — what's traded as parthenopipes may be a white-flowered blanchetii, or a synonym, or a separate species. Field literature inconclusive.
Cultivation
Mike's startup protocol:
- Started seedlings indoors under grow lights with warmth.
- After ~1 month from sowing, multiple tiny seedlings emerged.
- Slow to form decent colonies; once they reached a critical mass, growth accelerated.
- Made divisions of established plants and acclimated outdoors — bright filtered light all day, soil consistently warm in summer.
Outdoor performance: kept under shade cloth alongside the house, sitting on cement (which radiates heat into the night). Survived near-freezing temps and probable light frost without damage. As of late 2024, fall-formed flower spikes were beginning to open.
Mike notes the species likely requires cross-pollination — doesn't self-pollinate to seed under his conditions, which is good news (won't invade other Utricularia pots).
Photos (5)
Naming
Species-level. Mike treats this as a single accession; no cultivar name applied.