Nepenthes singalana is a highland 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...

pitcher plant

Pitcher plant

Pitcher plants are carnivorous plants whose prey-trapping mechanism features a deep cavity filled with liquid known as a pitfall trap. It has been widely assumed that the various sorts of pitfall trap evolved from rolled leaves, with selection pressure favouring more deeply cupped leaves over...

 species native to the island of Sumatra

Sumatra

Sumatra is an island in western Indonesia, westernmost of the Sunda Islands. It is the largest island entirely in Indonesia , and the sixth largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 with a population of 50,365,538...

. It is most closely related to 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....

and N. spathulata

Nepenthes spathulata

Nepenthes spathulata is a tropical pitcher plant native to Java and Sumatra, where it grows at elevations of between 1100 and 2900 m above sea level. The specific epithet spathulata is derived from the Latin word spathulatus, meaning "spatula shaped", and refers to the shape of the...

.

Taxonomy

In 2001, Charles Clarke

Charles Clarke (botanist)

Dr. Charles M. Clarke is a botanist and taxonomist specialising in the carnivorous plant genus Nepenthes. Clarke has an honours degree in Botany from Monash University in Melbourne, and a Ph.D. in Ecosystem Management at the University of New England, in Armidale, New South Wales.Clarke first...

 performed a cladistic analysis of the Nepenthes species of Sumatra and Peninsular Malaysia

Peninsular Malaysia

Peninsular Malaysia , also known as West Malaysia , is the part of Malaysia which lies on the Malay Peninsula. Its area is . It shares a land border with Thailand in the north. To the south is the island of Singapore. Across the Strait of Malacca to the west lies the island of Sumatra...

 using 70 morphological characteristics of each taxon. The following is part of the resultant cladogram

Cladogram

A cladogram is a diagram used in cladistics which shows ancestral relations between organisms, to represent the evolutionary tree of life. Although traditionally such cladograms were generated largely on the basis of morphological characters, DNA and RNA sequencing data and computational...

, showing "Clade 3", which comprises N. singalana and three other related species.

Natural hybrids

The following natural hybrids involving N. singalana have been recorded.

• 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. singalana
• N. bongso
  Nepenthes bongso
  Nepenthes bongso is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Sumatra, where it has an altitudinal distribution of 1000–2700 m above sea level. The specific epithet bongso refers to the Indonesian legend of Putri Bungsu , the spirit guardian of Mount Marapi.The species was formally described by Pieter...
  
  × N. singalana
• N. gymnamphora
  Nepenthes gymnamphora
  Nepenthes gymnamphora is a tropical pitcher plant native to the Indonesian islands of Java and Sumatra. There is much debate surrounding the taxonomic status of this species and the taxa N. pectinata and N. xiphioides....
  
  × N. singalana
• N. inermis
  Nepenthes inermis
  Nepenthes inermis is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Sumatra. The specific epithet inermis is Latin for "unarmed" and probably refers to the upper pitchers of this species, which are unique in that they completely lack a peristome....
  
  × N. singalana
• ? N. singalana × N. spathulata
  Nepenthes spathulata
  Nepenthes spathulata is a tropical pitcher plant native to Java and Sumatra, where it grows at elevations of between 1100 and 2900 m above sea level. The specific epithet spathulata is derived from the Latin word spathulatus, meaning "spatula shaped", and refers to the shape of the...