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It explores a lot of really fun gardening topics, everything from seed collection and storage

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So come on and join the Patreon over at patreon.com slash indefensive plants and help keep this show up and running in the process. I hope to see you over there. But in the meantime, on with the show. Hello everyone and welcome to the Indefensive Plants podcast, the official podcast of indefensiveplants.com. What's up? This is your host, Matt. Welcome to the show. How is everyone doing this week? I'm doing great because returning to the podcast is Dr. Cadeem Gilbert to talk more about the world of pitcher plants and their evolutionary histories.

You may remember Dr. Gilbert from episode 277, where we talked about pitcher plant symbiosis in the genus Nepenthe.

Well, that work has evolved into so much more and involves

questions like pH regulation and prey capture and trait differentiation all leading to the patterns

of diversity that we see in pitcher plants he's also expanded that work into the world of

North American picture plants in the genus Saracenia this is is such cool stuff. It's very complex work, but the

kinds of discoveries he and his lab are making are so worth the effort. So let's just jump right

into it. Without further ado, here's my conversation with Dr. Cadeem, Gilbert, welcome back to the podcast. It has been a while, my friend.

But for those that haven't heard our previous episode, let's start with an introduction.

Tell us a little bit about who you are and what it is you do. Sure. My name's Kadeem Gilbert. I'm an assistant professor at Michigan State University, specifically based

at the Kellogg Biological Station. And I would say I'm a botanist, an ecologist, and evolutionary biologist.

I've focused a lot of my work on carnivorous plants, specifically pitcher plants in the genus

Nepenthes, but also more broadly study plant biotic interactions, both with insects and microbes and really interested

in how plant traits can shape their interactions with other organisms. Excellent. And that evolution

of your career, was it based in evolutionary questions first? Or were you kind of a plant person

...