Dr. Martin Roy Cheek is a taxonomist and botanist specialising in the carnivorous plant

Carnivorous plant

Carnivorous plants are plants that derive some or most of their nutrients from trapping and consuming animals or protozoans, typically insects and other arthropods. Carnivorous plants appear adapted to grow in places where the soil is thin or poor in nutrients, especially nitrogen, such as acidic...

 genus

Genus

In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...

 Nepenthes

Nepenthes

The Nepenthes , popularly known as tropical pitcher plants or monkey cups, are a genus of carnivorous plants in the monotypic family Nepenthaceae. The genus comprises roughly 130 species, numerous natural and many cultivated hybrids...

.

Research

Cheek has described several new Nepenthes species, mostly with Matthew Jebb

Matthew Jebb

Dr. Matthew H. P. Jebb is an Irish taxonomist and botanist specialising in the ant plant genera Squamellaria, Myrmecodia, Hydnophytum, Myrmephytum and Anthorrhiza, as well as the carnivorous plant genus Nepenthes....

, including: N. argentii

Nepenthes argentii

Nepenthes argentii is a highland Nepenthes pitcher plant native to Mount Guiting-Guiting on Sibuyan Island in the Philippines. It is possibly the smallest species in the genus and does not appear to have a climbing stage....

, N. aristolochioides

Nepenthes aristolochioides

Nepenthes aristolochioides is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Sumatra, where it grows at elevations of 1800–2500 m above sea level. It has an extremely unusual pitcher morphology, having an almost vertical opening to its traps....

, N. danseri

Nepenthes danseri

Nepenthes danseri is a species of tropical pitcher plant. It is native to Halmahera and the northern coast of Waigeo Island...

, N. diatas

Nepenthes diatas

Nepenthes diatas is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Sumatra, where it grows at an altitude of between 2400 and 2900 m above sea level....

, N. hurrelliana

Nepenthes hurrelliana

Nepenthes hurrelliana is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Borneo, where it has been recorded from northern Sarawak, southwestern Sabah, and Brunei. It is of putative hybrid origin; its two original parent species are thought to be N. fusca and N. veitchii...

, N. lamii

Nepenthes lamii

Nepenthes lamii is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to New Guinea, where it grows at an altitude of up to 3520 m above sea level, higher than any other Nepenthes species...

, N. mira

Nepenthes mira

Nepenthes mira is a highland pitcher plant endemic to Palawan in the Philippines. It grows at elevations of 1550–1605 m above sea level....

, N. murudensis

Nepenthes murudensis

Nepenthes murudensis , or the Murud Pitcher-Plant, is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Mount Murud in Borneo, after which it is named. It is of putative hybrid origin: its two original parent species are thought to be N. reinwardtiana and N...

, and N. thai

Nepenthes thai

Nepenthes thai is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to peninsular Thailand. It grows on limestone hills at elevations of 500–600 m above sea level.Nepenthes thai has no known natural hybrids.-External links:*...

. Cheek and Jebb also raised N. macrophylla

Nepenthes macrophylla

Nepenthes macrophylla , the Large-Leaved Pitcher-Plant, is a tropical pitcher plant known only from a very restrictive elevation on Mount Trus Madi in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo...

to species rank. Cheek and Jebb revised the genus in two major monographs: "A skeletal revision of Nepenthes (Nepenthaceae)

A skeletal revision of Nepenthes (Nepenthaceae)

"A skeletal revision of Nepenthes " is a monograph by Matthew Jebb and Martin Cheek on the tropical pitcher plants of the genus Nepenthes. It was published in the May 1997 issue of the botanical journal Blumea. The work represented the first revision of the entire genus since John Muirhead...

" (1997) and "Nepenthaceae

Nepenthaceae (2001 monograph)

"Nepenthaceae" is a monograph by Martin Cheek and Matthew Jebb on the tropical pitcher plants of Malesia, which encompasses Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, and Singapore. It was published in 2001 by the National Herbarium of the Netherlands as the fifteenth volume of...

" (2001).

Cheek and his research are featured in the documentary The Mists of Mwanenguba.

External links

• The Mists of Mwanenguba