Usually they are re-potted during dormancy or in early spring. If your VFT goes dormant or not in winter depends on where you live and more important where your plant lives .If you keep it inside all year long, it may not really go dormant just grow a bit more slowly. They are best kept outside and with colder temperatures they will automaticly go dormant at the end of the season. If you only have one plant you can also put it in a ziplock bag and put it in the fridge during winter.(some people in warmer climates do it this way) In theory the plant will keep going without dormancy but the growth will decline over the years. You can self-pollinate a VFT and still get good seeds but it takes a loooooong time to get a grown plant(about 5 years,unless you grow the seedlings under light all year long) What you can also do is take your flower stem(let it grow but don't let it flower) and then cut it in 1-2 inch pieces,then put the pieces upright in live sphagnum moss(make sure they're the right side up).After a while ,small plantlets will devellop at the underside of the stem and you can get new plants that way. If you have a plant you really like this is the way to go,because the plantlets from the stem will have the same propperties as the motherplant, If you grow plants from seeds(even if from a selfed plant) you never really know what kind of plant you will get.

50/50 sphagnum peat/perlite or silica sand. You can also use LFS (long fiber sphagnum) by itself but IMO the roots will intertwine in it and make it harder to separate them if you ever do a complete media change which is recommended every 2-3 years due to mineral buildup. Yes you're going to have to use distilled or RO water if you don't save rain water. I now save water via a 55 gallon drum. It is possible to distill your tap water but hardly worth it. It will cost more in gas/electricity than just buying the water.

Yours were not the only weather bones making complaints. I told several people that this was not going to be pleasant. We had a forecast of over 1/4 inch rain today, getting icky tonight. Well, it was about 35F, raining, soaking everything thoroughly after lightning and thunder and a good bit last night. Next thing I know that rain was WHITE! Over half an inch of white rain later, it decided to get "clear" again, and now it's coloring up again. IT IS APRIL darn it! All my daffodils are lying face down in their beds! Now that I think of it, I might go bry my head in my bed too!

Larry, we are still in a drought here in OKC. The nice thing about snow is, altho it doesn't equal as much moisture as one would think (is it 10:1?), when it melts, it soaks in at a slower rate, and the ground actually gets more moisture than a hard rain, a lot of which runs off. Dawn, if we had a sustained cold, we would have probably had more plant damage. The ground is still warm, too. I don't know how the trees were affected, but plants lower to the ground were affected very little, if at all. You are absolutely right, Dawn, the GCs get a lot more attention. They grow faster than my plants, and I don't want to miss a moment in time. OT: The death of Whitney Houston this weekend, is just another reminder of how short life is. I was truly saddened by events. Her music got me thru a very difficult time in my life back in the 80s and I was a great admirer of her. Larry, I signed up for your Facebook page, but I'm not very good about posting. I will definitely read it, though, and thank you for friending me! Susan