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Carnivorous Plants

Well, I've been searching and searching for REAL perlite. You don't know how hard it is to find that here, my god. For the longest time I was finding Mirical Grow Perlite. Which is actually artificial and has a nitrogen, photasium etc etc rating on the bag. PERLITE IS SUPPOSED TO BE NUTURAL ASS HOLES! God, I hate Mirical Grow, what a crock of shit they pawn off on people.

I digress, sorry. I finally found real, volcanic glass perlite at Heights Garden Center. They are always overpriced, but quite frankly they have what most people don't. So I picked up a bag for $5 and went home to find my package had arrived from Cook's Carnivours Plants!!!

I opened it up and there was my VFT Big Mouth's in there. I mixed up the soil and soaked it (65% Sphagnum moss, 25% Peat Moss, 10% Perlite....or something around those percentages) then sperated the root balls.

The small one got planted and the large root ball is in the process of byfracating. It looks like it's splitting into two new root balls. That's what I love about these plants. They produce seed AND they split to produce new plants. Given the right enviroment, they can split extremely fast.


I'm going to give it a week to get settled in it's new home and then start to get it adjusted to being outside.

bigmouth608dv4.jpg
 
ok got a couple more questions, or just plain ol' rambling :lol:

how do VFT catch flies & whatnot ? I've been keeping my plants outside everyday, except rainy days & bringing them inside for the night. but I dont see any traps closed, ever (except the 1 fly I fed 1 plant)
I thought these plants have some chemical that'd attract flies & etc...

whats the deal, do I need to be feeding them in a closed in container like a fish tank ? & can you buy flies or whatelse to feed them that you can buy ? & some of the traps are pretty small to eat a fly.

they keep growing smaller new traps & the flower pods have not shown a flower yet(that I've seen) & now every plant has a flower stem growing, just black seeds/pods or ? showing.

to me it seems like the trap & stem dont live that long, I dont know if its because of alot of sunlight or not.

maybe I'm just too impatient :lol: I guess I envisioned these traps catching flies/mosquitoes like crazy & growing a huge clump of traps very quick.


edit**************
I forgot to mention why do the stems (for the traps) alot of them are not strong enough to keep the traps out of the soil, why is that ?
 
chilehunter said:
how do VFT catch flies & whatnot ? I've been keeping my plants outside everyday, except rainy days & bringing them inside for the night. but I dont see any traps closed, ever (except the 1 fly I fed 1 plant)
I thought these plants have some chemical that'd attract flies & etc...
Click to expand...
VFT's catch flies by putting out UV light which the bugs are attracted to. They see the light and say "Bzzzz Bazzzzzz bzzz bzzzzz!". This translates to, "Oh look! A flower! Let's go polinate it!"......and the flytrap says, "Gulp!' And the cow says, "Mooo".

It's different for other CP species though. If you don't see traps closed than you probably don't have enough traps ;) The more hungry mouths to feed the better the chance of food spotting the traps. The Pot of Death used to catch all sorts of stuff from spiders all the way to large crickets (which went in head first and was still twitching away two days later.......mwahahahaha....I actually have video of that somewhere)

chilehunter said:
whats the deal, do I need to be feeding them in a closed in container like a fish tank ? & can you buy flies or whatelse to feed them that you can buy ? & some of the traps are pretty small to eat a fly.
Click to expand...
Go get a butterfly net from the internet or a store and go hunting for flies. Stick said flied in quart jars. Stick jars in refridgerator for 30 minutes. Take fly out with tweasters (held onto their wing) and stick the sleeping guy into a trap. Trap will close, fly will wake up, be confused, start to struggle more, trap will close tighter (they like live food and can the differance) and will be happy. If traps are too small, feed it ants.

chilehunter said:
they keep growing smaller new traps & the flower pods have not shown a flower yet(that I've seen) & now every plant has a flower stem growing, just black seeds/pods or ? showing.
Click to expand...
Post a pic of the seed pod thingy. Some people say if you let the plant flower it dies shortly after that..........I say that's bunk b/c I've never seen that happen.

chilehunter said:
edit**************
I forgot to mention why do the stems (for the traps) alot of them are not strong enough to keep the traps out of the soil, why is that ?
Click to expand...
Post pic.
 
ok heres a picture

you cant really see the black seed/pod or if its the flower part that died, but follow the curly stem from the right side plant.

you'll notice the white flowers on the left, well not opened unless thats considered opened ?

as you can see some of the traps are like at soil level or part way in the soil, like they dont have enough strength to be upright like the other trap/stems. unless this is kinda normal & it just happens.

as for dieing once flowered, I dont know anything about VFT's but I dont think thats true, because that plant on the far right had a flower stem when I bought it & then the flower went dead/black & now it has another flower growing (well they all do)

DSCF1371.jpg


as for catching some flies & ? with a net, yea that'd work & free just would need to make a netting out of some tulle that I was gonna put over my chiles for seeds. but I was just curious if a pet store sold something like 100 flies for $1 so I could just throw plant/flies in a fish tank until flies are dead.

I also made this picture smaller to see what size it'd be (my other pic's were bigger so just trying a different size pic), so it wasnt to big for dial-up users but I now see its kinda small to see all detail but it'll work.
 
Is you soil moist? Can't quite tell. Do you have them in direct sun? Anything less will cause the spindly leaves. Yes, they do look a little weak.

How long has it been since you planted them in the pot? BTW, it looks like that is Dente or Typical for the type of flytrap (would have to have a closer pic of the trap to be sure). This type does produce longer leaves that are supposed to stand more upright than others.
 
I water it every couple days,give or take about half of 1 gallon when I water. yea it dries out some but the roots still have some moisture (when the top looks dry)
the stem/traps dont change much between watering & drying some for stem/trap location to soil.

yes sun, thats all there is here - sun :lol: unless clouds roll in but theres no shade for my plants except if placed next to the house in certain locations.

I'd have to say about 1 month since I planted the VFT into the container which they are in now, but had the plants about 2 weeks before transplanting the traps.

as for which type of trap it is ? I threw the original containers out but think they're just basic VFT ?
the stem part is about finger length, well some are smaller but most close to finger length or longer
 
Try not to let the top dry out so much. Also, are you using tap water or distilled water/rain water?

After you answer that question, I'm out of ideas.
 
I'm using distilled water, even though I'd rather use well water but you all say use distilled.

well heres another picture that shows what the stems are doing, I dont know if this is normal or not but it kinda sucks having some traps in the soil. then a couple of the traps never form like they stay a little toothpick at the end of the stem & just die.
& I finally seen 1 of the flowers open up today :party:
I tried to get everything in 1 picture (flower & sideview of traps)

DSCF1382.jpg


it took forever for the traps to close today when I fed them (well 1 was fed a fly & another closed but the ant got out)
 
chilehunter said:
I'm using distilled water, even though I'd rather use well water but you all say use distilled.

well heres another picture that shows what the stems are doing, I dont know if this is normal or not but it kinda sucks having some traps in the soil. then a couple of the traps never form like they stay a little toothpick at the end of the stem & just die.
& I finally seen 1 of the flowers open up today :party:
I tried to get everything in 1 picture (flower & sideview of traps)

DSCF1382.jpg


it took forever for the traps to close today when I fed them (well 1 was fed a fly & another closed but the ant got out)
Click to expand...

Those traps don't look too happy. How's the ph?

dr
 
the ph is a hair over 6 (just a simple probe type tester, so it's in the ballpark of 6 ph)
soil is 50/50 or maybe 60/40 - peat moss/ spaghum moss (sp?)

humidity varies, some days in the 40's & some days in the 70's-80's (thought if I kept it watered enough it'd be alright during the low humidity days)

I let water drain from the soil, have 1" plastic spacers in bottom container to hold up the soil container to allow for drainage.
should the soil be drenched ?
 
chilehunter said:
I'm using distilled water, even though I'd rather use well water but you all say use distilled.

well heres another picture that shows what the stems are doing, I dont know if this is normal or not but it kinda sucks having some traps in the soil. then a couple of the traps never form like they stay a little toothpick at the end of the stem & just die.
& I finally seen 1 of the flowers open up today :party:
I tried to get everything in 1 picture (flower & sideview of traps)

DSCF1382.jpg


it took forever for the traps to close today when I fed them (well 1 was fed a fly & another closed but the ant got out)
Click to expand...

Thats the same thing that my Strawberry plants i had last year.
 
stillmanz said:
over feeding just water them for a month or so and see if they improve
Click to expand...


do you mean
- feed them as much as possible & water them alot
- or just water them alot w/o feeding them, let them catch their own food

the way you said "over feeding just water them for a month" I'm slightly confussed because how you said it, was their supposed to be a comma in there ?

like I said I water them every 2 days, 3 days at the very latest (which I dont even think I've let them go that long w/o watering)

also, feeding them has its own issues. 1st the traps dont like to close in a timely manner. 2nd I dont have patience to stand there & wait for the trap to close up on a fly/ant that I'm trying to feed it :lol: if they closed kinda quickly I'd have no problem but damn I could take the alive insect & rub it inside the trap & touch the outside feelers & the trap still wouldnt close or it would slowly & sometimes close w/o the food in it :(

& I still havent made a net to catch some free insects, but most of the traps are pretty small (except for a couple) where I dont think they could hold a fly.
 
Well, what the watering does (like on most plants) is help to rid the soil of the waste that the plant produces (everybody poops....yes, that book was right). So if the plant was being over fed, extra flushing of the soil will get rid of the waste that might be stunting the growth.

Now my minds a whirl with ideas for you problem, let me spew (watch you feet...just like a mental Sea World, there is a slpash zone). When I was getting traps the size of yours I was battling two things, one was a fungus (white), and aphids (or at least something that resembled aphids....they are very similar) take a look for both.

Another thing that causes traps that size is too much humidity. Now, this is more rare of an accurance, but it can happen. If it's too humid outside, than bring it inside and place it in the house where it gets the most sunlight possable.

As for the taps not closing fast enough; Trap closing speed is in direct correlation to amount/intensity of direct sunlight. More sunlight=faster trap cloasing speed. In direct LA sunlight my traps closed so fast you could her them, *TWRRRAWP!*. Amazing stuff. Now, since you said that the traps are having problems, I am going to have to say that this is the root cause of slow trap closure more than the sunlight, but it's also something to take into account. Maybe you really aren't getting as much sunlight as you thought.


Like I said, just going down lists of thoughts.
 
let them catch there own prey for a bit I think,
also some peat has slow release ferts in it, not saying this is the case though, I've read that traps not formiming can be signs of high nitrogen.
give it time but they will probably come good, mine have looked ragged and crap for ages but are comming good with new shoots I thought they were gonnas for ages lol
 
IGG & stillz
I appreciate the help your giving to help me find out whats wrong, as for what both of ya said,well I'll hit each item said.

- humidity, I think I read it somewhere VFT like at least 50% humidity ? as for my location most times its in the 40%-60% range but theres times for 70%-90% humidity not often but still not uncommon either.

- sunlight, when I place them outside its on the south side of the house, no shade unless in the form of clouds but UV rays still penetrate the clouds some.
& what I mean "when I place the plants outside" is because of overnight temps, theres been some days in the mornings its in the 40's or mid 50's for temps & I leave early 6am (6:30am at the latest) & heard VFT's dont like those colder temps so sometimes I leave them inside & cant comeback to put them out, but the plants sit right next to the sliding glass door facing south & still get about 8hrs of sunlight.

- waste from plants through the roots, this I've never heard of or thought of. maybe I shouldnt recycle the water in the bottom container & just water the plants with it again ? reason be it from plant waste or some other kind of stuff from the soil mixture, maybe I should keep letting the water flush the soil out.

- aphids, I look at the plants basiclly everyday & I've never noticed any aphids.

- mold, dont see any of that.

- over feeding, I have 4 plants in 1 container, & I've only personally fed 2 of'em 1 fly each since I've had them & haven't notice any trap closure from any other trap (that stayed shut cuz of an insect inside)

- picking dead stems/traps off, I started to pick the dead ones off right away after IGG mentioned that I should, to conserve the plants resources.
but 1 question about if the trap had a fly inside it & it kinda looks like its slowly dieing off, do you pick the stem/trap or allow the trap to live as long as possible to get those nutrients from the decomposing fly ?

also the plants are still growing new stems, some traps form but some die off in the little toothpick stage.also still growing flowers.

- nitrogen, dont know whats in the soil ? but just looked at the bag of peat & its "canadin sphagnum peat moss" brand "les tourbes nirom peat moss inc." & that I mixed this with some "shredded sphagnum moss"
funny thing I never noticed the peat moss is shagnum moss, thinking I had 2 different soils mixed together :lol::oops: I guess there was no need to buy that other bag label "sphagnum moss" I gotta stop glancing over things quickly :lol:

sorry about the long post, but I'd just like to grow a big "pot o' death" or was it "killing fields" ? that looked so cool, I want my own :lol:
 
Killing Fields was the 5 gallon tank, Pot of Death was the small pot with 100's of traps open. ;)

Here we go again with typing up a storm, lol. I think we can rule out humidity being the cause. It's getting enough sunlight. Don't recycle the water. Like I said, that's going to have the plant poop in it (you wouldn't want to keep drinking your own pee, would you? Well, that is unless you were eating Amanita shrooms.....weeee!!!). You're not overfeeding them either, that's good.

To answer your question about picking the dead traps. The best time to cut the leaf off is when the whole head has turned brown and the leaf is still yellow. That goes for when it has prey in it's trap as well. It's starting to come down to the flower as the cause......we'll see what it does when it's not flowering....
 
Sorry once again I haven't been following this thread, and with my next two questions it probably really shows. How easy are they to grow from seed as they sell them for kiddies to grow? Also can you start them anytime of the year?
 
They are a fickle pickle to grow from seed but can be started indoors any time of the year. VFT's are moederitly easy to grow from seed barring that you have fresh seed. Any other kind takes more skill to grow (although some Serrecenia are easy to sprout) and some giberellic acid doesn't hurt to have lying around either.
 
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