Hm, underlit. The ironic thing is that initially I thought I was overlighting it so I pulled it back. I had even given it up for dead when I put it back in the windowsill for giggles (and to protect my other pots from the window crashing down on them), after a few days I noticed the new growth.

I dunno if the pygmy is a pygmy or not. It's either a pygmy or a reaaaly young plant. There are about 4 or 5 clusters in there, it's really interesting. We'll have to see. About how much time will it need to grow out of the "pygmy stage" if it's not one?

One odd thing is I thought there were water droplets on the little... "stems" that are in the center of each cluster. I touched one only to find out it was thick, gooey stuff -- nectar, perhaps? Very odd.

I don't have any overhead lights yet -- do you know of any stores online that sell them, so I can get an idea of what I'm looking for? I donno if I can put up lights in my room, but we'll see.

Right now the lot of them are sitting on a tote that's level with my windowsill. They're about 6-10" away from the window, which is facing south. They seem to be doing good there, unless the VFT and Cape Sundew are only surviving because of fertilizer pellets in their soil.

As for the butterwort and bladderwort, I think my plate is full for right now -- maybe after my D. Adelae starts to recover. :) Thank you for the offer, though -- maybe in the spring when things warm up? I'd almost want to just get seed of them and see how hard it is to grow directly from seed. :)

I picked up one of those 3"x6" pots. I had a kind of realization today -- I'm planting everything in the same soil, so even if worse comes to worse and it's not a pygmy, I could plant two plants in one big pot like that and it should be fine.

One thing someone around here (who admittedly isn't a botanist) suggested is perhaps getting a plant that I could grow alongside my CP that would absorb the impurities in tapwater -- something that would soak up the excess minerals and whatnot. Does such a plant exist?

I have nothing else to add but a rule in identifying pygmies is that they never grow beyond the diameter of a dime, except for D. scorpioides. The most popular D. spathulata sold in the "Death Cubes" is a hybrid of spathulata and rotundifolia, known as D. tokaiensis.

You have a lot of work but it will take about a month for your sundews to recover. Just listen to the advice of everybody and you should do fine. If they die well. You can learn from your errors and try again. If you ask everyone, you will find that most have killed their first plants. It happens, so good luck.

I'll try to get some closer pictures of my little one. It's hard to explain -- My other plants are all radiating out from a central point. The little one is radiating out from 3 or 4 points all in a cluster. The entire plant, leaves and all, is just barely bigger than a quarter.

mcantrell,

If your plants were fertilized they would die within a few weeks and would not look so great before they died. They would all slowly decline and blacken, growing smaller leaves until they just withered away and the roots rotted completely.

The D. spatulata grows a clump like you are describing. A single plant will grow short roots out and create clones around itself. Over time, this one plant will become a dome like clump that contains dozens of plants all about 1-2 inches across at most. D. spatulata is not a pygmy, but is small.

{{gwi:562448}}

What I meant by underlit is that when you got the D. adelae from the store it was probably in extremely low light. Now that you have it, the green leaves atop the stalk are showing life due to the light your giving it. Just do not give it direct sun. Indirect window light is great for it, so long as not too much direct sun streams in and burns the leaves.

The droplets on sundews are sugars produced by the plant to attract insects. When insects touch the leaf, they become stuck in the sugary glue and the plant produces more to mire the insect until it suffocates, then it produces digestive enzymes to break down the insect's proteins into nitrogen. Insects apparently are not bright enough to realize that landing on glue like food is fatal.

I use the four foot long shop lights which are florescent 40 watt tubes. Twin mounts are great and produce 6000 lumens. I use two of those, making up a 4 foot long shelf that gets 12000 lumens of light. Place them about 5-8 inches from the plants. A D. adelae will get all the light it needs from that alone... but the Purple Pitcher and Venus flytrap will need that and the window to really do well. Shop lights can be found in hardware stores and cost less than 10 dollars each. The tubes are cheap too and last for years, but replace them each year to maintain intensity. My light setup cost me less than 24 dollars with two shop light mounts, four tubes, and one Christmas tree light timer set for 16 hour cycles.

Many plants do use trace amounts of calcium, magnesium, and other mineral salts, but the amounts in tap water would damage the soil and kill carnivorous plants faster than a typical alfalfa garden could remove it. Safest bet is to just avoid tap water and go for distilled or purified water that indicates that all minerals have been removed (drinking water has minerals added, so stay away from that too).

Hello everyone!

Sorry for bumping this thread, but I figured my ramblings didn't really merit a new one.

So, I have some updates from my little garden.

My Cape Sundew is doing well. For some reason, the flowers, upon blooming once, immediately shrivel and die. I worry that that's due to being scorched by the sun, but I really have no solution right now. I'm thinking of buying one of those car UV shades that you use for newborns and trimming it a bit to cover just the Cape Sundew.

One odd thing about it is that it has TWO flower stems growing up right now. I believe what's going on is that it's just gotten big enough to be two plants down in the dirt, but I'm not sure.

My Spatula Sundew is doing well. I screwed up with my planting, so the "bulb" is slightly above the dirt -- so it has nowhere to grow. I plan on fixing that soon by repotting it. I was initially too scared to touch the leaves, so I really couldn't maneuver it well, but now that I've watched it grow for a few months I realize that the leaves are pretty tough, and that accidentally wiping off the "dew" isn't going to kill it. :)

My Purple Pitcher plant hasn't grown much. One trap has wilted away, the rest are just... static. I am going to just call it dormancy and all that. I have not put it away for the Winter yet, I plan on doing so tonight (by putting it in a bag and then putting it in my fridge -- the temperature around here is averaging 10-20 F at night, so it's clearly far too cold to do the outside thing like I wanted).

My VFT is doing the same -- kinda static right now. Again, winter, so I plan on letting him dry a bit (tonight and tomorrow) and then putting him in the fridge as well. Plan is to put them in the bottom, in the crisper, and calling it good.

I lost a plant, an American Pitcher Plant that I bought at Albertsons (a grocery store chain around these parts). It was wilted and probably was already dead when I got it, which is why I got it -- I wanted to see if I could bring it back to life. It was odd, it was in a plastic pot, inside a clay pot. Very odd -- I saw similar ones at another store that were just in the plastic pots. One odd thing is that there's a white "fuzz" appearing in the middle of where the plant was. It vanishes if I wash it, but comes back after a week or so. I'm planning on just throwing out all that medium, as I'm afraid that might be mold.

They were marked as being from Bloomrite, www.bloomrite.com, apparently.

My Pine Bonsai is doing ok, it started to wilt so I put a little bit of plant food in with it, and, um, it tripled in size in about a week. It hasn't grown since, but it's not wilting now.

My Tropical Pitcher Plant also hasn't grown. At all. However, I fear I messed up with it -- I planted it in a Peat/Perlite mix, instead of a Peat/Perlite/Bark mix. In addition, I put it in a potter that was MUCH too big for it -- so it might just be growing "down" where I can't see it. I'm not sure if I should repot it or just hope it does ok for now in the less than perfect dirt...

And I actually have a surprise, which is what prompted me to post.

My D. Adelae, well, died.

I decided to trim off the dead leaves, which didn't leave much. Just a tall (5" or so?) stem with 2 tiny, feeble, brown/green, translucent, leaves.

Upon doing so, the entire stem fell over and blackened. After that, it never recovered, and I chaulked it up to a combination of the Deathcube harming it and me being clueless finishing it off.

Well, I've been watering that pot just for giggles, because I did manage to get some more Sphagnum growing in it, and I had a distinct hope that the roots would be able to pull through and start a new plant.

I got home tonight and noticed the tiniest of green poking out of the peat. Looking closer, I have a little, itty bitty plant shunted off the "bulb" from the Deathcube. It has a root coming down from it.

I have to assume it's a baby D. Adelae... I mean, those Deathcubes seem to have some extraneous plant matter in with them (longer stickish things, odd stems that almost look like Kudzu, etc), but, I can't imagine that would be what sprouted...

So yeah, happy day. I don't think I could kill a D. Adelae if I tried at this point.

One worry is that the "line" of material coming from that green plant back to the main, dead, plant is also dead and black, should I cut that off just to be safe, or just call it good?

Meanwhile, I bought a few new plants recently, although when I say recently, I mean, "yesterday afternoon while bored at work." I went through carnivorousplantnursery.com, I've never used them before, but, we'll see. I'm also thinking of picking up Mr. D'Amato's book from California Carnivores soon.

I picked up a Early Butterwort (Pinguicula primuliflora), a Pale Trumpet (Sarracenia alata), which I think is what I had that died, a Cranberry Plant (Vaccinium macrocarpus) for giggles, as well as a cup full of live Sphagnum Moss. This will let me repot my Cape Sundew without worrying about losing the Sphagnum that's growing on it.

I also picked up at the same time a Terrarium Bowl (7.5"), a few "mini egg" Terrariums (which I only got cause they are cheap, and I would like to give away small cuttings to friends), and maybe most importantly, one of their "Wingless Fruit Fly" kits.

Have any of you grown Fruit Flies to feed your CPs? I was thinking of getting a small translucent plastic box with lid, maybe 12" square and 6 - 12" deep, and grow them in there instead of the Vials that the kit ships with. I was going to use fruit of some kind (I was thinking peaches or peeled apples) and then a bowl of the yeast stuff for the larve to grow in.

Anyone have any ideas if that's a waste of time or not? My plants seem to be growing quite well without being fed, but then again some of them have stopped actively growing, so...

Also, I have permission to bring a plant or two into my cubicle at work. I'm thinking either a small bonsai (a grape vine bonsai or a sacred fig bonsai would look nice, I think), but... are there any CPs that could survive in a corporate environment like that? My building used to be a grocery store, so the lights are standard florescent lights, about 40 feet up, and are on from 5 AM till Midnight. I could probably bring in that Terrarium Globe to grow them in -- but unless I can find a light kit that I can power via USB, I cannot bring in any lights.

Any thoughts? Should I not even risk it?

Baby D. adelae, instead of being "lance-leafed", are rounded shaped. They're real good at perpetuating themselves.

I have informally cultivated fruitflies a few times - rotting fruit in plastic containers. A little gross, but effective. Great for butterworts and sundews!

Drosera capensis will produce plenty of flower stalks, they might both be coming from the same plant. Most sundew flowers only last half a day to a day before shriveling. Drosera capensis are full sun plants so their flowers would not die in ultraviolet light. Sometimes they produce seeds and sometimes they do not. Try transplanting to a larger container and more light if possible.

The Asian Pitcher Plant will be fine in perlite and peat, just make sure the mix is 2/3 perlite to 1/3 peat to increase drainage. No water tray under the plant as standing water can lead to root rot.

You will likely notice more sprouts from the Drosera adelae. Leave them alone for now and let them grow larger. In a few months they will be full grown.

my capensis just finished blooming with 15 flowers, and I only got 2 see perhaps 2 fully open. They shut very quickly.

If you were going to bring one CP into a non-ideal environment, I'd give a split decision between D. Capensis and D. Adelae. D. Adelae likes lower light levels, but it develops a lovely, desirable, red color when grown in good lighting. D. Capensis will grow almost anywhere, but I'm not sure if it would do well in such low light.

I'd probably lean towards capensis. Mainly because, if you kill it, it's incredibly easy to replace.

Hello everyone, I'm about 6 months in now, give or take, and have gotten a decent enough setup going nowadays.

My Purple Pitcher Plant is dead, I fear, I have been putting it out on the porch as it's the most cold hearty plant I have (I am not sure if it's S. Purpurea var purpurea or S. Purpurea var venosa, it was a random mystery plant from a Lowes Deathcube). Well, the one day I decided it would survive a night out was the night it decided to stop being 40 at night and suddenly be... 20. Whoops. Sarracenia-cicle.

Is there a way to make them more likely to survive a frost like that? Bigger pot? Some mulch? One of those heat-pad things? Someday I'd like to grow some of them outside, and, with our weird weather here in Idaho, that's going to be challenging.

My major concern right now is the supplies that I've been getting at the local Fred Meyer -- the only place I can find that sells Sphagnum Peat Moss -- that I have been using with my CP -- namely, stuff from a company called Whitney Farms.

They sell quite a few small bags of various potting mixtures -- Sphagnum Peat Moss, Sand, etc, and some bigger ones ("Orchid Mix" that I was going to use on my Nepenthes if I ever repot it, more Perlite than I'll ever use in my life, etc etc).

I've gotten all my potting supplies from them, more or less, but I'm a bit worried about their sand.

They have a bag of "White Sand" which I picked up but am not sure is something I can actually use. A picture of the bag can be found here:
http://www.amazon.com/White-Sand-2-Quart-Bag/dp/B000ZOPWG8/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=garden&qid=1209511610&sr=1-9

Does anyone know if this is a form of sand that would work for a CP potting soil, in a Peat/Sand mix? It appears to be white beach sand or something similar -- very, very, VERY fine particles that vaguely glisten like glass, of which I am worried will be too fine for my CP. I heard "Silica sand" is good to use for CP -- is what I'm describing Silica? This picture I found of Silica looks rather similar to the white sand I'm talking about:
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/images/content/109920main_ACD05-0022-023.JPG

My other question is if anyone has had any luck with their "Washed Sand". It appears to be essentially washed river sand -- it's extremely fine gravel, more or less, with some larger smoothed pebbles mixed in. I've been mixing it in unwashed to test it out (usually a 2:1:1 Peat:Sand:Perlite mix) but I'm worried that it's just not the right type of sand for CPs.

My VFT has the most of it, I didn't mix up a large batch well enough that I was using to repot a few pots all at once, and the VFT got, as far as I can tell, a 1:2 or 1:3 Peat:Sand mix. Whoopsy! It's getting repotted tomorrow when I plant the rest of my new plants.

Their Sphagnum Peat Moss has a blurb on the label about not having to fertilize for up to 40 days after planting, but every one of their bags has that blurb, so... I haven't had any bad luck with their peat moss, but then again, I overwater my CP quite a bit, so any added fertilizer would be leeched out pretty fast.

I ask because of a few reasons -- I have a (apparently) sand-loving Pygmy coming tomorrow in the mail, so I'm going to need to use sand more than I really feel comfortable with, and really, REALLY don't want to kill it. The *huge* bag of perlite I have varies from microscopic perlite dust to large, 1/4th of an inch chunks, so I could just borrow a sifter and make some "perlite sand" for the pygmy instead...

My VFT is starting to get some odd brown spots on it, and it's new traps seem a bit malformed, so I'm worried there's just too much sand in it's mix (probably going to repot it tomorrow) -- but if it's the sand itself killing it, and not the malformed mixture of sand/peat, well... I'd like to know while it's still saveable. :)

And last but not least, I discovered that the local Lowes and Kmart sell extremely low cost huge bales of "Sphagnum Peat Moss", but I'm not quite sure it's real or not. The company's name was marked "Premier Pro Moss //Hort" located in Canada. A quick Google shows a slightly fancier labeled bag of it here:
http://www.premierhort.com/eProMix/Gardening/Products/GrowingMediaTM/ProMossHort/fProMossHort.htm

Is that real Sphagnum? I read recently that some companies sell random moss as Sphagnum, as it's become kinda a generic name for "moss as a soil additive". If so, I might just buy a bale or two of that and have enough peat moss to never have to buy more again.

I also picked up a "gro-light", a 50W spotlight style bulb. I'm testing it in a desk lamp in my closet with some Hyssop and Strawberry seedlings, and so far so good, the Hyssop actually *exploded* with growth when I moved it from the shelf against my window to under that lamp... which is probably a bad omen, come to think of it.

So, anyway, here's a listing of my bedroom garden, 6 months in:

Cape Sundew x2 -- One is my original one from Wallgreens, now a huge monstrosity with leaves going everywhere and about 5 or 6 flower stems. I still haven't seen any seeds from it, though. The other one is a very very small albino one (white sticky bits instead of the red ones of the bigger plant) that I got as a gift for a $100 purchase. The little white one has actually conducted gnat genocide in my room, it's leaves are full of gnats, which was a total shock to me.

D. spatulata -- Now flowering for the first time ever, I repotted it and intentionally buried it a bit around the edges, that seemed to wake it up, as it really started growing after that.

VFT -- Not happy, it didn't take winter in my fridge well, and it's currently mis-potted in a too sandy mix. Really, the soil feels a bit like cement.

A "Lowes mystery Nepenthes" -- Growing extremely well in it's huge 8" pot, has a 5" pitcher growing now, and it's still going -- it hasn't opened up yet!

Pinguicula primuliflora (aka "Early Butterwort") -- Flowers a lot, but still doesn't catch anything.

S. Purpurea -- Probably dead, it froze solid outside. It grows very slowly for me, either way, so I won't know for sure for a long while -- although until it froze, it was growing new traps rather quickly (I am assuming it finally got out of it's dormancy). Now the new traps have turned black and flaked off.

S. "Mystery" (aldelae?) -- I went to Lowes 2 days ago and discovered they have more CP out, although not as big a collection as last year. I snagged another copy of the mystery sundew that I killed before, I hope to get a picture of it soon for everyone. Once again, I remain unimpressed with Lowes potting abilities (the root bulb is a good 2" out of the pot!)

They also were selling what I *think* were pygmys -- they had very, VERY small sundews that were maybe half an inch in size, 4 or 5 to a pot. But they were still very young with no nectar, so they might have just been seedlings or somesuch.

I also picked up a Dunecraft "Carnivorous Creations" dome on the cheap at the local toy store:
http://dunecraft.com/products/carnivorouscreations.htm

It's in the fridge for a few more weeks, going to see how well it works. I'd be surprised it anything comes of it, to be honest.

I have 5 new plants coming tomorrow:

S. leucophylla x2 -- So far, all my Sarracenia other than my Sarracenia Purpurea have died, I'm hoping these make it. In my defense, my other Sarrcenia have been mostly dead when I got them, having rescued them from local grocery stores in a mostly wilted state. I make no excuses for the Pale Trumpet I killed that I bought, though -- that was just me being absolutely stupid. The nursery that shipped it to me cut some of the pitchers in half before shipping, and I finished the job, and the shock killed it dead. =/

Sarracenia Purpurea var Purpurea x2 -- One for my windowsill, one for my porch. Hopefully these will be winter hearty enough to survive outside here. If so, I might be able to start up a small bog garden.

Drosera pulchella x nitidula -- I have a nice 9" x 4" x 5" pot that I plan on potting this single plant in, and hopefully getting it to fill the entire thing up over the next few years.

I wanted to actually get S. 'Adrian Slack' instead of S. leucophylla, but that's still pretty hard to find (read: impossible, I believe). Just as well, I am worried I'd kill it, and killing a plant that pretty is probably a crime in some areas. ;)

One final concern -- I have a bunch of little egg mini-terrariums, which I've been using to sprout seedlings and generally grow smaller stuff that I'm afraid to put in a normal pot. For the most part these things are fine, except... well, they get this odd... "crust" on the edges of them, and the soil occasionally turns an odd greenish color. I've been cleaning them out when that happens, but... It's a bit worrysome. Is that a bug or mold or something? Am I using too much water? Do I have contaminated soil or something?

In addition, some of my pots, mostly the teracotta pots from Fred Meyer, get an odd white fuzz on them. It even hit one of my glazed pots recently, wherein it turned an ugly green color instead. I've been cleaning them off with hydrogen peroxide and water, but it keeps coming back. Am I just keeping things too wet around my plant shelves?

Good sand is pool filter sand. I am also using creek sand that I collect. Whatever you do, rinse all soil media well before using. Peat in the big bales (2.2 or 3.4 cm) is probably the real deal. Many brands appear (Lambert, Schultz,...)Again, rinse the peat. Also buy dried LFS.

So long as you have your pots exposed to the air, an inch or so of water in an open tray setup is good. It's also a good idea to water when the tray becomes dry. Good lighting also helps tp prevent mold.

Venus Flytraps are generally hard to grow indoors because of their high demand for sunlight and whatnot, so your flytraps decline can be any number of things. The "malformation" sounds a lot like aphids to me, but if your growing them inside common sense says thats unlikely. you should be able to see them if they were there, sucking the life out of your plants. S. leucophylla also demands high sunlight, so if it starts to decline that may be your problem. What are the temperatures where you live right now?

Well, I did discover little white "dots" in the sand of the VFT when I first repotted it (from the original Walgreens potting). It also had an interesting tendency to get "webbing" on top of the soil.

Today -- high of 53, low of 31:
http://weather.yahoo.com/forecast/USID0263_f.html

I donno why, but this seems COLD to me, especially for late April / early May. Later this week we're going to 60-42 or so. I am hoping that a S. Purpurea var Purpurea could survive outdoors here, but, we'll see...

I don't really have the resources to wash sand... unless there's an easier way. I buy distilled water 3 gallons at a time, and... Well, I guess I could find a 5 gallon pot or two, and wash and store the sand outside...

Try this: Set up a used bath towel like a hammock, with 4 stakes, one on each corner, with a small depression to accommodate soil media. Then use a garden hose to rinse it through.

Because you said today was a low of 31, im guessing the night temps get a bit chillier. I grow my VFT and Sarrs outside on our houses deck in Pennsylvania, but right now we are in the 60's, so big temp difference. However, I kept them outside in the winter until night temps got a few degrees below freezing. A good indicator of when its you should be bringing them in is if the trays water starts to freeze into a harder sheet of ice ( what you DONT want is the tray water to freeze completely).. A little bit of ice in the water is fine, just as long as it doesn't start happening every night. As the temps start to regulate out to above freezing, you could certainly put them outside.
S. Purpurea is one of the most hardy Sarracenias when it comes to cold temperatures, so it should have no problems.

Where the little white dots moving? The webbing on the soil has me worried because that is a very good indicator that you could have some nasty pests living in your soil such as mealy bugs spider mites, or even thrips, all of which can be very damaging to your plant. If any of your plants seem to decline or have discolored leaves, check for bugs and let us know! If that happens leave a description and hopefully one of us can figure out what pest you have, as well as recommend treatment options. It can be very difficult to identify a certain insect, and eradicate it. I currently have 2 neps that have bugs living in the soil that cant identify, therefore I cannot tell if they are harming the plant or not. Even with the toughest insecticide, infestations can be hard to eradicate so be sure to try and catch it early. Even after spraying my bugs with Ortho Systemic Insect Killer, it seems like it had no effect at all!

Good Luck!

Hm, is washing with non-distilled water safe? That was my big worry.

Yeah, reading through Savage Garden, I decided they were spider mites and washed all that medium off the plant's roots and tossed it out. The dots were not moving, but this was after 2 months in the fridge -- they could have been in hibernation.

I am more worried about the weird crust appearing on my translucent egg "terrariums" (and the green slime that appears). I overwater those, though, so... Maybe that's it.

But the "strange white dust" that keeps appearing on my pots, especially my terracotta pots, has me the most worried. I'm *thiiiis* close to buying a large batch of nice glazed, plastic and glass pots (that one neon green one on California Carnivores is really cool looking) and repotting *everything*.

The same plant that had the dots (my VFT) is the one that has a bit of discoloration and is kinda shriveled in spots right now. I am hoping it was just dying of thirst from my overly sandy dirt, as it didn't have many white roots, and those that were there were kinda gnarled, like it was thinking it was growing on a rock or something. I'm hoping a looser soil will help.

I hate to think of bugs in my nep's pot. That thing is huge. The trap I mentioned above finally opened -- it's about 2" across and 5" tall, give or take. Ferociously big plant, and getting bigger every day.

My new plants arrived, and they threw in a free VFT, so I have a spare one in another room now. Yay, backups!

Pygmy was smaller than even I expected, and shipped bare root. A tiny bit of the soil mix -- they have the "almost sugarcrystals" dirt that Whitney Farms calls "White Sand" -- I think. I'm using "Washed Sand" which AFAIK is river sand. Hope it survives. It appears, looking at it, that it actually is 3 plants in a little cluster. Really, really hope it survives.

The two White Trumpets are side by side in a 6" pot. The pitchers were mostly cut off, so, we'll have to see how well that works. I noticed the roots were a bit rootbound, so I'm guessing these are all grown in a neat little 1 - 2" wide greenhouse kit or something.

Both Purple Pitcher Plants have splotches of dry, brown color on their traps. We'll have to see how they work. I have both inside in 2 separate pots, with plans on growing one out on the porch, but he's not going out until I'm sure he's growing well.

As for the night temps, I assumed 31F *was* the night temp. Ugh. I'll watch it tonight and see how low it gets. And yeah, when the bad freeze happened the entire tray under the pots froze absolutely solid. Pretty sure it's dead -- I already threw out the blackberry.

Whatever is appearing on your terrarium eggs/pots/plants is without a doubt some kind of fungus/mold/algae/etc. Over-watering encourages this growth, but it gets frustrating because cp's require such a wet environment. If you shop on california carnivores, you will see under growing supplies "Physan 20". This works great because it works on both fungus/algae/etc. You can try to disinfect your pots that way, or just get new ones like you said. (yea, that neon green one does look cool). If you dont just want to go out to a Lowes/Home depo for plastic pots you can also look on Cobraplant.com, they have nice, cheap plastic/hanging pots for sale as well.

The Pygmy seems to be doing good, although it's kinda potted at an angle. There's 3 of them in a little cluster, and I couldn't get them flush with the soil, I was too afraid to pull them apart. I hope they're not affected too much by it.

I also picked up a Drosera Scorpioides from California Carnivores. I really wanted the deep dish saucers for my pots (got 10 of the small and 5 of the large) and the book on Greenhouses... but it felt bad to not buy a plant, too. Going to put it in a more standardized pot than the 9x4x5 monster.

Is there any specific trick to getting them to make gemmae? I was going to just grow them like my cape sundew for right now, but I'm rather interested in getting some gemmae for "backup" plants, gifts to friends, filling up that big pot, etc etc...

I picked up another one of those mystery sundews, I'll take a picture soon. This one is doing a LOT better than the first one, keeping it right next to my other plants in the windowsill. It's new leaves are appearing right next to each other (unlike it's old leaves which are spaced out quite a ways apart) and have red tentacles. I hope to have pictures soon. It's above the top of the pot by 2 inches, in a mound of long-fiber sphagnum, to water it I've just been using a turkey baster and "injecting" water straight into that mound. Works well.

That brings up something that another thread mentioned that I hadn't considered. I use shredded or minced or whatnot (short fiber?) sphagnum, mixed with perlite or "Washed Sand" for the majority of my plants... I hadn't considered growing things directly in long-fiber Sphagnum. Does that work really well? The Mystery Sundew is currently in long-fiber sphagnum, and if that's a way to get my VFTs to do a bit better, I'm all for it.

Pigmy sundews produce gemmae during the fall months, generally speaking.

Sand, peat, and LFS are basic natural media for most CP's. A lot of people also use Perlite. Most CP's need a combination of moisture retention and good drainage, with variation from there. Sand and Perlite provide good drainage. Peat holds water well. LFS retains water but also allows for drainage. Usually, the topmost layer in nature is living LFS, followed by the dead matter (peat), followed by sand. There is usually a transitional mix as one goes deeper. LFS is the best overall media out there and if given a choice of just one medium to use, LFS is the one.

Ah, so I don't have to make sure to dry them out a bit during summer for dormancy to get gemmae? That's good to know, I was really worried about that.

I might try LFS next time I repot, right now I use this:
http://www.mclendons.com/item.asp?sku=10152400&cat=Garden&subcat1=bark%2C+soil%2C+%26+fertilizer&subcat2=

Usually with some Perlite mixed in, which has worked so far for me.

Supposedly the pigmy sundews go through a hot and dry dormancy in Australia, but it cultivation it hasn't seemed necessary... and they still produce gemmae in October / November.

First casualty of the new plants -- the Indoor Purple Pitcher Plant started turning "soggy" and dark on the edges, I lifted the pitcher up and it came off the base. All of them came off like that, leaving a little black and brown nubbin in the middle of the pot. I noticed some of the roots were visible, I might put more Peat on top if there's a chance it will survive...

This is the exact same thing that happened to the butterwort that I had... Is it a lack of sun or overwatering or something else? The outside Purple Pitcher, which I thought I was under watering, is still doing fine.

S. purpurea doesn't mind being saturated. If it is new it could just be reacting to the change, as would all CP's. Hard to know if it is just in shock or on its way out. The butterworts should be only moist. Too much sun too fast can cause a reaction.

Well, it's literally just a nubbin now, no traps at all. However, I have another Purpurea that is coming back from something similar, so... It's under the grow-light for him, at least until I see a new sprout (if I ever do).

My outside one is doing fine still, albeit going very slow. The pitcher it had growing when it came from CPN is open and looks ok, there's another tiny one that's not moving at all, hopefully it's just shock and it will get over it. I'm not surprised though, the previous Purple Pitcher I had (the one that's under the sun lamp, growing pitchers again) took months and months to wake up after I got it.

I did notice that when I put new peat moss in the Inside Purple's pot (to cover the roots) and saturated it, the water wasn't draining at all -- after about 3 or 4 minutes I took a pencil and shoved it up the drainage hole, which caused a flood of water to come out. I am guessing something was stopping it from draining completely. Was also a bit worried that the water was coming out brown instead of clear, but that's probably just the new peat.

Peat is great for retaining water but not so great at drainage.

My purps sit in a tray of water that always has an inch or two of water in it. These are OUTDOOR plants. Growing it indoors is your problem. Get it outside in full sun.

Ok, so, when stopping by Lowes for some supplies for my grape vines I stopped by the CP section, discovered they had a Ping in (which I picked up, it looks like an Early Butterwort, so I put it right back in the old one's pot) and a "Purple Pitcher Plant" that looks absolutely nothing like a S. Purpurea.

It honestly has me stumped, one dead pitcher looks like S. Purpurea, but the other 2 look like the trumpets coming off my White Trumpet -- but now that I can recognize the symptoms of low light in a S. Purpurea, it might just be that. Someone once told me Lowes sometimes sells S. x 'Judith Hindle' as a "Purple Pitcher Plant", would be sweet if that's what it is, but I doubt it.

I planted it in a drainless planter and 100% (well, 95%, I mixed in a bit of perlite just in case) Long-Fiber Sphagnum, and put it on the porch in full sun. It already seems like it's doing a little better, the pitchers are standing up now instead of just flopping around. Right next to it is my planter with both my White Trumpets inside, I'm honestly not sure if they should stay in my windowsill or not, but as long as it's warm out, there's no reason to keep them inside.

I moved my first VFT, my resurrected Purple Pitcher Plant, and my "outdoors Purple Pitcher Plant" -- the one I bought specifically to grow outside 100% of the time -- outside as well, they are sitting in a tray of sorts. Basically it's a clear Tupperware tote, about 12"x9"x9" or so. Since it rained rather fiercely yesterday it's got a good 4" of rainwater in there now, although it rained so much that some of the peat and perlite was knocked out of their pots and into the water. Looks ugly but it should be pretty darned pure water -- I hope, anyway.

I hope once the VFT starts doing a bit better to take a cutting and clone it, I would be really overjoyed if I could find some way to make a backup plant of it and my Cape Sundew, just in case of disaster. Out of all my plants those two are the ones that I most want to keep alive.

Speaking of said Cape Sundew, I'm rather proud of it -- it's outgrown it's current pot (Again), and has roots growing out the drainage hole. Time to repot! (Again)

Um... a quick worrying thought this morning as I head out to work. I've put my White Trumpet, VFT, and a few other CPs on my porch. It's been dropping to the mid 40s at night lately here.

Lately I've noticed a bit of browning up on my plants, this morning it's a bit further along -- the entire plants, tip to base, are turning brownish. The White Trumpet's new trumpet specifically is now turning from a green to a brownish color. It's getting plenty of water, so I would hope it's not dehydration. It's not quite the same brown as the tips of the traps get, but I could see it getting there in a day or two -- but this is up and down the entire pitcher, not just at the top.

The VFT is actually shriveling up in spots, I have a few traps openly wilting away, and the new traps coming in have seemed to have stopped growing. The other traps have large patches of dry brown. I took it out of the rain water tray (since the rain water has evaporated to the point that it doesn't get into that pot) and filled it's pot with distilled water -- the distilled water took and oddly long time to drain through the pot and into the saucer.

The Purple Pitcher Plant is even getting in on the fun, too -- the one I'm talking about is the resurrected one, the sun light wasn't giving it enough juice so instead of pitchers it has these odd looking "elephant ear" leaves right now (looking like extremely LONG baby traps). Said Elephant Ear leaves are getting brown in spots.

Could the rain water they've been getting have been contaminated? Are they just in shock about being moved from a windowsill out into sun part of the day? Could it be the temperature at night (40-50s) or day (70-80s) doing it?

More than likely it's just the shock of temperature changes, though contaminated water could also be a possibility. Give them time, like weeks, for new pitchers / leaves to replace the shocked ones.

I have some new pictures:

Bedroom Garden:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Bedroom%20Plants.JPG
And captions:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Bedroom%20Plants%20Captioned.jpg

Closer, but out of focus picture of the Cape Sundew:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/CapeSundew.JPG
I'm really proud of him, I need to re-repot him, he has about 3 roots trying to come out of the drainage holes.

Close up of the N. Ventricosa (?) (note the 2 bites the kitten got out of it before getting flung 20 feet):
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/MonkeyCup.JPG
Freaking HUGE cup:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/ZomgHUGE.JPG

If I can negotiate some window-space with one of my roommates, I'm going to put him out on a hanging basket in the front room.

An out of focus shot of my mystery pitcher:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/MysteryPitcher.JPG

An out of focus shot of my D. Adelae(?):
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/MysterySundew.JPG

Will try and get better shots. The Mystery Picther is odd cause it has S. leucophylla style traps as well as a S. Purpurpea style trap.

The odd coloring now on my white trumpet:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/OddColoring.JPG
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/OddColoring2.JPG
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/WeirdColoring.JPG

I'm worried that it's turning PURPLE as well as brown now that it has full sun. Maybe it's not a pure S. leucophylla?

My almost assuredly dead Ping (it did NOT like being left out at night):
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Ping.JPG

Zoomed out shot of the porch plants:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/PorchPlants.JPG

The purple pitcher plant on my porch:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/PorchPurple.JPG

A Pygmy Sundew (Drosera pulchella x nitidula):
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Pygmy.JPG
(I plan on filling that entire planter if I can keep this one going until I get gemmae.)

My Resurrected Purple Pitcher Plant:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Ressurected.JPG
(It is deformed cause I did not realize it was starving for light under the sun lamp, I am hoping those "elephant ears" will keep it alive to grow new traps.)

Scorpion Pygmy Sundew (D. scorpoides):
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Scorpion.JPG
(2 of the plants toppled over after I got them, the plants unfortunately got bumped around a bit during shipping, and some of the soil fell out, so they weren't braced well, I added about half a cup of peat moss but I am worried that one of them won't make it)

A closer picture of my "Spatula" sundew (D. tokaiensis or D. spathulata or D. rotundifolia):
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/Spatula2.JPG
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/SpatulaSundew.JPG

My Long Suffering VFT:
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/VFT.JPG
(Planted after dormancy in a too sandy mix, so the new traps came up deformed and brownish, the 4 new traps should be better, I hope.)

The base of my 2 white trumpets, in a 6" planter.
http://kita.ath.cx/plants/06.01.08/WhiteTrumpet.JPG

Someone pointed out that where they are sitting on the porch, the rain water might have picked up stuff off the shingles before dripping into the plants. I had not thought about that and am honestly kinda worried about it...

you know...not to go against the grain to everybody's answers, BUT

Sometimes it works just to leave them in their cubes for a while. Yes, we all know theyr'e called "Death Cubes" yada yada but there's a reason why the cultivators of these plants mass produces them and sells them in these cubes because 1) humidity keeps the plants temporarily happy 2) the medium they grow in is good. Granted, there are cost-effective factors involved too but most of these plants are clones grown from tissue-culture so they don't have the genes for survival like wild plants. The cubes are what works...at least in the short run.

I myself have grown plants in these cubes with no problems. D. adelae flourished, Dionaea spread, and Sarracenia puffed up...even Darlingtonia stayed red until I removed them and planted them in their own pots and subsequently died. My advice wouldn't be to take them out of these "death cubes" right away. I would leave them in there, perhaps open up the top for a bit so they get acclimated to lower humidity and then slowly introduce them to another pot/medium, terrarium, garden, etc once they're growing big and robust. That way you don't have to worry about over-stressing the plants out too much. Think about it..they've just been transplanted into the Cube and now that they're semi-adapted, you're goinig to remove them again and stress them out some more?

Experienced growers can take plants out and put them into the right condition. For first timers, I wouldn't shun away from the cubes right away. Just my 2 cents.

Johnny

lol i didn't want to read all that but i found your pic, very nice with the enlarging the enlarged pic. I think were going to need some dental records to identify that mystery sundew plant.

Ah, pretty sure it's D. Adelae, the new growth definitely looks like it, and the Lowes Deathcubes have them in them pretty frequently.

The mystery pitcher plant from lowes is sending up it's first new growth -- I can tell cause the rhyzome is a bit above ground. Might need to give it a bit more LFS, to be honest... It doesn't look too much like a D. Purpurea pitcher yet, but then again, it's only about 3mm long right now. ;)

I also noticed my first shoot from my S. leucophylla coming up from under the soil -- it's buried a little deep. A bit worrying as it's coming up as that weird red/purple color, not green like I'd expect. Very, very odd.

Bit of a disaster with my Pygmy D. pulchella x nitidula -- the poor thing was being buried in the soil every time I watered from overhead, so I was taking a bit of soil out of the pot when I noticed a string. Without thinking, I tugged on the string and the pygmy came up with it. Then the string -- pygmy's major root -- broke off. ACK.

I put it in a different, much smaller pot, one that I could put in a deep dish saucer, which is working MUCH better for watering it. It hasn't browned up yet, and it did have 1 more major root, so... maybe it's not dead yet.

Will be a miracle though.

spycyspider? I haven't seen you in like 4 years!

I would agree that the death cubes would be good as transitional homes, but the plants need drainage and those cubes don't have that feature, unless holes are drilled.

Ugh, Drainage is a scary thought, since I have my S. leucophylla and Mystery Pitcher are both in planters with no drainage at all. I read in Savage Garden and a few other places that it should be ok like that.

In addition, doesn't the use of the tray method kinda muck up the whole drainage thing? None of my trays ever get completely empty...

Not if you don't keep the water level too high. Top watering allows a cleansing of the soil media. All the "tray" does is ensure that media and thus the plants don't dry out.

hahaha yes i've been MIA from all carnivorous forums for a while now...been busy finishing grad and starting med school.

Doesn't mean my obsession with these plants got any less, however. Still got those dews you sent me a while back growing big and strong...in their original pot!

Glad to hear the plants are doing well and that your education has been augmented.

Just noticed my first guest plant! It looks like my Spatula Sundew (maybe my cape sundew) had some seed that landed in my Monkey cup's pot that actually managed to sprout. It's now about 1 inch tall, woo!

Given how slowly that stuff grows, that seed must have landed there months back -- so it can't be my Spatula sundew, as it just recently started flowering for the first time. My Cape Sundew has been flowering regularly ever since I got it, awesome little plant, although I wish the flowers lasted longer.

My Spatula Sundew, btw, has a mutated flower stem that's actually growing a small plant instead of a flower -- I forget the term for that. I donno how to get that one to root, though... Maybe once it's grown a bit I'll try.

Vegetative apoximus and false vivipary.

Hm, will it just grow roots out of the blue like that, or should I try layering / air layering it?

Ok, some stuff!

* My first guest Seedling, a small Cape(?) Sundew in my Monkey Cup's big pot, is doing well. I am worried about overwatering it, but it seems to be surviving just fine. I almost want to leave it be and let it grow up beside the N. Ventricosa, I think it would do ok there.

* The Pygmy Sundew is turning yellow and brown, it's dead. Might replace it soon, need to buy a new Ping anyway.

* The DuneCraft Carnivorous Creations has been out in the windowsill for 4 weeks now with no sprouts. I fear it is a lost cause.

So. 1 Year in. Where are we?

I am actually moving out of my house into an apartment. The apartment will apparently have significantly less sunlight, although I am not sure. My roommate got a "Top Fin" 30 Gallon Aquarium Kit from the local Petsmart, apparently they have a smaller kit that's just a 30 Gallon Aquarium and the Light. It's a single light, about 2 feet long -- I have to wonder if a similar kit would make a serviceable terrarium in an emergency.

I split apart my two White Trumpets. The drainless planter they are in was killing them, their media stunk to high heaven. I instead got a second drainless planter and put a plastic pot in each one. This lets me pick the plastic pot out and check the water levels -- in essence, the drainless planters are saucers in this setup. Still, it works, and they still look nice.

I repotted my D. Adelae, my Cape Sundew 'Alba', and my D. spatulata in a 7" plastic terrarium bowl that I have had laying around for a long time. I put too much soil in it, so I'm hoping to dig a little out -- and with the help of a little water to make it a bit malleable -- lower the soil level tomorrow. As it stands they're all right at the rim, but... I'd like them to have a little room to grow.

The D. Adelae had a stupidly huge root system. It was growing in pure LFS, never repotted from the Deathcube pot. It wasn't doing too great, it was growing great leaves but it's dew wouldn't stick around. I am hoping a better environment will work.

The D. spatulata was actually a colony of about 6 plants, I put two back in it's original container and 4 in the terrarium. No sense not keeping a backup. ;)

Decided to steal one of my Monkey Cup's guest plants, a Cape Sundew seedling. It's now in the Terrarium too. If my Pygmys do any gemmae, I may sprinkle some in the terrarium between the other plants.

Heck, once I have a better idea of my new living situation, I might just move those plants out into individual plants or a more traditional great big 7.5 or 12" pot and fill the plastic fishbowl thing with Pygmy gemmae.

Speaking of Pygmys, I repotted mine about a week ago. Took my 2 Butterworts (P. moranensis and P. grandiflora) and my 2 Pygmy Drosera (D. pulchella x nitidula and my lone surviving D. scorpioides) and put them all in a nice big mix of Sphagnum, Perlite, and White Horticultural sand in a huge 7.5" pot. It was kinda scary repotting the pygmys, but I just took them out soil and all and plopped them on top of the soil in the pot, and worked them in. They did not seem to have the huge roots I associate with pygmys, for some reason.

The sickly butterwort (Grandiflora, I believe) had stinky media, I think it was approaching root rot. It's very tiny, has died back to just 2 leaves half an inch thick. The other Butterwort lost a leaf in the move, but seems to be ok. It's odd -- wherever the leaves actually touch the ground, they brown up and die. As long as they're not on the ground directly, they're fine.

The scorpioides seems to be happier, it has put out 2 or 3 new branches. I was worried because it was doing what it's 4 brothers did -- the tips of it's branches turn crispy and brown and never do anything, then eventually it spreads to the main plant. Similarly, I had lost some of the p. x n. but the majority of them have perked right up since being moved to the bigger pot.

About when should I start looking for the signs of Gemmae production? And what are those signs? The main part of the plant swells up a bit and then I see green "peas" in the middle?

You transplanted the pygmy sundews without them reacting?! Wow, you were fortunate! Look for gemmae from now until the end of fall. Use a magnifying glass as it may not be readibly discernible.

Not only did they not react, they seem to be doing BETTER. The hybrids are getting bigger, the scorpiodes has new, living branches, etc etc.

Just got word from my apartment, I'm a go, so... hopefully will be moved in in a few weeks. Going to hopefully put out a table on the deck I have, and see if that has enough sunlight. Normally I wouldn't be worried but it's in a cluster of apartments and there's 3 story buildings all around.

The scorpiodes is actually kinda scaring me, every single one of it's branches spread out, get ready to open, aaaaalmost open... then turn brown. But just on the tips.

Until the plant dies, then it spreads to the base of the plant and, yeah.

D. scorpioides is way cool!

{{gwi:562450}}

{{gwi:562452}}

Um... Yeah, mine aren't quite doing that. Their branches spread out, the "cups" almost open and unfurl tentacles, and then... they turn a brown crispy color and shrivel up. Just the tips, mind you -- at least at first. A similar thing happens to my VFT that's in the kitchen, as well as my White Trumpets, but not nearly as bad -- their new leaves get a tiny bit of black or brown on the tips and never open up.

Not sure if they're not getting enough light, or if they're dying of thirst, or what, but... Well, hopefully the little guy will survive long enough to make Gemmae and fill the pot.

Speaking of Gemmae -- when I do see them, will they let me know when they're about ready to spread out? Like, will I be able to see hairs or something? Or should I just make sure to drop a drop of water on top every few weeks from here on in?

Also, Does D. Madagascariensis look like a cross between D. Scorpioides and D. Stolonifera, or was that just a weird photo of one I saw on eBay?

D. mad.... is a weird plant. They will hang down a cluster of leaves like a spider plant. Here's a pic of mine:

{{gwi:562454}}

I would use a magnifying glass rather than depend upon water or stipules. The crown will look like a collection of green pits.

Huh! Weird! Will it create new stalks and actual clusters and stuff? I might have to get one once I'm sure my new digs can support CPs.

how do i take a d.adelae out of a death cube with out hurting it