Sun/wind scald...peppers can sometimes handle it, though. If you see new growth coming up from the apex/tip of the plant producing new leaves you might be able to nurse them through. When it comes to hardening them off, it's baby steps for the first few days. You might want to wait until you come home and start by putting them out for just a couple hours in the future for the first few days of hardening off. The wind tolerance of leaves is as important, sometimes more important, than the sun tolerance. It's all about building up a bit of outer protection on the leaves to lessen water loss and sun/wind beating down on them. It's a good idea to get them first initially used to the wind, so a shaded or part-shaded are works.

Hello lindaflower, Venus Flytrap leaves turn black when they die from fertilizer. In bright sun, they turn red if the cultivar is not an all green type like the Dente. If your Venus Flytraps are not in intense enough light, they will not produce red coloration no matter what cultivar they are. It usually takes a few weeks or even months to observe the evil work of impurities in carnivorous plant media as it usually builds up slowly. Just a tiny bit can be introduced over time each time you water the plant, then poof, dead plant. Each roof is going to be different, so if dead matter builds up on your roof from leaves, bird droppings, etc, then washes off in the water, it might affect the plants. If the roof materials are toxic to carnivorous plants, like copper nails and runoff catch systems, then toxic copper impurities are being slowly introduced. Some roofs might be clean and runoff might be safe to use from them. The thing is, who knows what might be the culprit, so just keep changing your tactics until you figure out what killed the plants before. I found out the hard way that keeping a supply of rain water in a 55 gallon drum was a bad idea as it eventually builds up microorganisms and nitrogen levels go up over the course of weeks or months. You might be fertilizing the plants without realizing it. I always use distilled or reverse osmosis water that states that all impurities have been removed and nothing added.

I wouldn't fertilize at this time since the plant is stressed. I would wait until you sees signs of improvement or fertilize VERY lightly. What I would do is just as you thought with the wick. Good thinking by the way. Use a wick and let the wick pull the moisture out of your pot faster than it has been, helping it to dry out faster, by setting your pot in something so that the wick hangs. If you are growing in plastic, it is farely easy to judge when to water. If in a clay pot, I would use a wooden dowel of some sort and wait until it comes out farely dry after pushing it into the root zone to get you through to the repot. I find that my trees are at their peek right about the middle of May to June. If it were my tree, I would hold off until then when the tree shows remarkable signs of improvement and growth. Good luck and if you need anymore help, feel free to ask us. Mike

thanks jack, I plan on aerating this fall and de-thatching to remove any dead brown material next spring. The lawn is very thick and weed free. Even though most of the dollar spot is in a full sun area; the large amount of rain we received this spring and some poor judgment on my part with over watering (never had an irrigation system before) provide a rich environment for the dollar spot. I am hoping changes to my lawn care system will alleviate the problem next spring. I am trying to understand the proper timing to water. i.e. when the grass appearance indicates it needs water, screw driver insertion test etc. I also plan on completing a soil betterment program this growing season that Morph had suggested based on a Logan Lab's Soil Test result. Along with supplementing the program with Milorganite in early September.