Utricularia paulineae is a spreading perennial from south-western Western Australia. It offers a different life cycle from the small annual bladderworts of the same region: its vegetative network is part of the plant's continuing growth. The broad lower flower lip and pale upper lip provide a starting point for recognising it when flowers appear.
A species named for its discoverer
Kew accepts Utricularia paulineae Lowrie, first published in Nuytsia in 1998, with a native range in south-western Western Australia. The retrieved record lists no synonyms or accepted infraspecific taxa. Kew POWO.
Allen Lowrie named the species for Pauline Lowrie, his wife and research assistant, who discovered it in the field. Earlier material had been treated under other species concepts, including U. inaequalis and U. dichotoma. Original description, 1998.
The section guide places it in Pleiochasia within subgenus Polypompholyx. Supplementary species table.
Vegetative growth and flowers
Lowrie described branching stolons near the soil surface, carrying groups of leaves, traps and rhizoids. Patches could reach about 60 cm across. Leaves were 7–10 mm long including their stalks, and inflorescences 7–20 cm high. The lower lip was 10–14 mm wide, usually violet, with a pale lemon upper lip; the spur extended beyond the lower lip. Original measurements and description.
The reported patch width describes lateral spread, not plant height. Keeping these dimensions separate helps make sense of a photograph in which a few small leaves occupy the foreground while flower stalks rise above a wider colony.
Florabase records erect stalks without scales, two calyx lobes and a kidney-shaped lower lip. Its colour summary is violet and yellow. Florabase description.
Peat wetlands and shade
Florabase records black peaty sand on swampland flats and creek margins, with distribution in the Jarrah Forest and Warren regions. December appears in its flowering record. Western Australian Herbarium habitat account.
Lowrie documented southern coastal localities between Karridale and Walpole, often beneath dense Melaleuca scrub. He observed more flowering where vegetation had been disturbed or opened, including a site after fire. This was an ecological observation, not a controlled flowering treatment. Original field observations.
The practical inference is to examine light and competition when a healthy accession grows without flowering. The observations do not establish that a cultivated pot needs fire, smoke or deliberate damage. More than one environmental factor can change when vegetation is removed.
A published grower's experience
In a 2014 first-hand forum account, the grower “Tough” included U. paulineae in an open aquarium on a south-eastern windowsill. The plants used equal peat and sand, water near substrate level and, for Australian species, a thin sand surface layer. The grower reported slow growth and sparse, infrequent flowering in U. paulineae. Grower's account, September 2014.
This is an individual cultivation report, with no measured temperature or light trial. It provides a starting reference for a wet substrate system, while the botanical account establishes the perennial habit. Neither supports automatically applying the dry finish of an annual seed crop to a living accession.
Maintaining an identified colony
Track new leaf groups and the continuity of the colony as well as flowering. If a propagation trial separates part of the stolon network, retain a parent portion and record whether the detached material establishes. Keep such trial results distinct from a proven, general propagation protocol.
Flower photographs should show the lip outline and the relative length of the spur. Record the original source label and any later determination together. That history is especially useful for a species that was recognised formally only after earlier collections had been placed elsewhere.
Reviewed 23 September 2026. Cultivation evidence is explicitly anecdotal; dimensions and field ecology follow the original description and herbarium record.
