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The carnivorous plant thread.

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One pain in the ass completed. I put off trimming dead leaves for far too long. Talk about a tangled mess! The planter of pitcher plants had living leaves wound through clusters of dead ones. Took me 1/2 hour to sort through the clumps and remove what needed removing. Gonna be so much easier when I repot these things into individual containers at the end of winter. The soil needs renewing anyway, and it'll be SO much easier to keep them watered. The big planters are good when they can get lots of rainfall to maintain the water levels. Sheltered in a screened patio, they're a pain to keep hydrated. Another stupid Weasel mistake.
 
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And tonight it's going to get a BIT too cold here, so I had to bring Fang inside. Downside to growing a plant from Borneo outdoors... even Florida winters are too cold for it.
 
More carnivore prep work. Since I'm planning on dismantling those large planters at the end of winter & repotting the contained plants into separate pots... I'm going to lose all of the fallen Drosera burmannii seeds that have dropped when I discard the old soil. Luckily, a few of them bloomed late, so I was able to collect the seeds in a small plastic bag. It's now residing in my fridge until spring. I'll sprinkle them onto the soil in the new pitcher plant pots & reestablish those sundew colonies.
 
Just found this at the local Barnes & Noble! I have SO been wanting this! The newly revised 2nd edition with updated cultivation info & data on new species & cultivars since the first edition. I've just read through it a bit, and I am SO glad I got it! Excuse me while I go geek out some more. :D

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Good thing I got that book. Seems that one of the soil mixes I've been using has since been found to be not as good for carnivores. Glad to find that out now before I repotted the plants in the old mix in a couple of months.
 
So... I have moved to Texas. All pitcher plants have been uprooted, shoved in ziploc bags with damp strands of sphagnum moss, made to wait for a week, then got repotted into their new homes. Some are starting to come back, others are either thinking about it, or dead. Not sure which.

Sundews are REALLY freaked by the climate change. I expect a few weeks of dying back before they recover.

On the plus side, I bought a new Venus flytrap today to replace my long-dead ones.
 
Once warmer temperatures settle in to stay, I think I'm going to have carnivores growing better than I ever have before! They get full direct sunlight ALL DAY here! I'll just have to make sure they stay well watered during the dry season.
 
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I was afraid this would happen. The flytrap's leaves are turning black & dying. I'm hoping it's just shock from the change in environment & that it'll return from its rhizome in a few weeks.
 
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Jessi said:
I moved into an apartment that gets way more sun now, but I have no bugs :woops: If I got a flytrap could I feed it something else? Can it photosynthesize? Do I have to buy crickets from the pet store? :lol:

Yep, all carnivorous plants photosynthesize, they just need the extra boost from digesting insects to grow well. I've had awesome results using MaxSea fertilizer. You just dilute it WAY down & spray it on the leaves once or twice a month during the growing season. You can get it here, and they add a sticker to the container with the proper dilution ratio. (They also sell awesome carnivorous plants. I bought most of mine from here.) http://www.californiacarnivores.com/maxsea16-16-16fertilizer.aspx

Also, here's a link to their Growing Tips section. Well worth reading before you order anything, some plants can be a real headache. http://www.californiacarnivores.com/californiacarnivoresgrowingtips.aspx
 
It turns out I didn't get 1 new flytrap, I got 2. There's a super-tiny trap just visible coming up in the pot. I guess 2 seeds must have been put in this pot by mistake.
 
For those growing carnivorous plants keep in mind that they are used to poor soil conditions ... For climate consider the insects they feed on, it varies with species.

For Drosera, they can appear quite dry and dead for times during the year, but they are tougher than they appear, wait for them to return annually, they have quite a lovely flower also. They are native here, I have 3 varieties about 50m away in my local park (think in this region we have about 5 Drosera sp.). Climate is hot dry summers, warm wet winters, and poor sandy soils. We find them in undisturbed vegetation, with a good overstory, and quite thick shrub layer...high competition. If you were to sweep net this shrub layer you can easily see their insect supplement, but it is generally seasonal.

Jessi with your flytrap, do not feel you need to feed it insects it will do fine without. Anything that triggers those little red hairs it will try to eat, give it some time with other plants, it will likely catch something.
 
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OK, things have started to SUCK. The sun here turns out to be a bit much for some of the plants, which surprises me. It's burned most of the sundew seedlings & most of the Cape sundews that were coming up. I also believe I've lost the white trumpet pitcher plant. I've ordered some 30% rated shade cloth to put over the end of the greenhouse that gets the afternoon sun. That should help.
 
ThunderWeasel said:
OK, things have started to SUCK. The sun here turns out to be a bit much for some of the plants, which surprises me. It's burned most of the sundew seedlings & most of the Cape sundews that were coming up. I also believe I've lost the white trumpet pitcher plant. I've ordered some 30% rated shade cloth to put over the end of the greenhouse that gets the afternoon sun. That should help.

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Most of my plants have been chewed up to the point of being almost totally destroyed. Damn Texas grasshoppers, swarming everywhere. I've brought what I can inside & set up a recovery terrarium. Here's hoping...
 
For those that were wondering, here's the damage. These are only the plants that I was able to bring inside. EVERYTHING has been chewed on by those damn grasshoppers.


My hybrid Venus flytrap, before and after.

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My forked sundew, before and after.

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My Cape sundew, before and after.

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My threadleaf sundew. I didn't have a before photo of this one.

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Update to the carnage:

The plants that I had to leave outside are holding their ground, for the most part. A couple are looking really shaky.

Of the ones I brought in... it appears that the Cape sundew and forked-leaf sundew both didn't make it. I'm not TOTALLY counting out the chance that some new growth may eventually come back from the roots, but at this point there are no visible signs of life from either plant.

The threadleaf sundew is trying to send up new growth. Waiting to see if it takes. The hybrid flytrap is also kinda weakly attempting to put forth new leaves. We shall see.

DAMN YOU, GRASSHOPPERS!!!! :angry4:
 
...aaaaaaand this morning I go out and find they've decided to start in on what I left outside. :-x :angry4:

I managed to make room in the 'hospital' for 3 more plants, the rest I just had to move up high & hope the damn grasshoppers will avoid that area, as they'd be too exposed to birds & such.
 
I'm thinking about mostly abandoning the notion of growing plants outside here. I'm going to try to clear space for a second larger terrarium inside. I can then grow them in an area safe from those DAMNED GRASSHOPPERS, and then when winter dormancy hits some of the plants, I can move them outside into the cold. That will keep them happily dormant, and the grasshoppers will all be dead by then. When the plants start to 'wake up' in springtime, I can move them back into the terrariums before the next infestation of grasshoppers start to hatch. Not the most elegant solution, but it'll have to do til I can get a place of my own again & get a REAL greenhouse set up.
 
New terrarium purchased, SO, here's where I stand:

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Main Tank: Left to right, recovering sundew Drosera filiformis var. tracyi, Venus flytrap, pitcher plant Sarracenia flava, another Venus flytrap, pitcher plant Sarracenia alata, pitcher plant Sarracenia purpurea, my not-doing-so-hot hybrid Venus flytrap, another Sarracenia purpurea and a Sarracenia x 'Dixie Lace' in the back right corner.

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Recovery/propagation tank. The back left pot contains the remains of my Cape sundew. Don't know if it'll ever come back. The other pots ALL contain Fang, who you may recall seeing pictured back at the beginning of this thread. The plant was SO torn up by the grasshoppers that I felt destroying it was the best option for saving it. I cut up the stalk into sections, treated the lower ends of each section with rooting hormone, stuck them in pots and am hoping for the best. (The rightmost pot on the bottom contains Fang's original root system. That MAY send up one or more new plants.) I won't know the results for weeks, maybe months. SLOW growing plant.
 
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