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CPs and Martha Stewart

DavyJones

Is ready to take this hobby to a whole new level
My mom was watching television this morning, and called me and said, "I saw a commercial for Martha, and she is showing meat eating plants today." I took it upon myself to go online and see if I could find the segment. Simply enough, if you go to todays show (Tuesday, Jan 20) under show highlights, and there you can see 2 clips, one where some gardener talks about CPs, and then he and Martha arrange some hanging baskets using nepenthes, orchids, and bromeliads. The info he gives is pretty basic, and he says that you can feed VFT's small amounts of raw meat, but other then that, it was a good promotion for the hobby, with some good examples of CPs. She even said they are some of her favorite plants, watch out for the swarms local CP nurserys! You might have just been made a fad!

http://www.marthastewart.com/affiliateinfo
 
Cool. Those hanging baskets looked so incredible! Was that N. x 'Miranda'?
 
I like it when he said the lids on neps are decorative landing pads...
 
haha! i always new martha would have some episode on carnivorous plants!
 
I don't think they'd be to happy being planted with ferns and orchids, even though they might grow together, and did you see how they just pulled them out of the pots? and put them in pure peat!!! THE HORROR

If I were on that set i'd jump on stage and denounce her the evils they just showed the audience, even thoug its good publicity. And those huge neps, look so healthy, just to be thrown in there :(
 
Yeah, I really didn't see anything wrong with what they did. I usually applaud people who find more decorative ways to incorporate their plants throughout their house. Not every nepenthes needs to be a specimen in some grow rack. I think many nepenthes are hardier then people give them credit, and especially more so when they get big and acclimated to their environment. They seem to be much more resilient as they get larger.
 
depending how yah water they could be perfectly happy in peat and bark chips......your watering habits tend to dictate more about what soil you use for Neps and orchids than anything.......if yah keep your neps in a tray of water you need an open airy mix......if yah like to go quite awhile between waterings you can get away with a pretty dense mix...........
 
Perhaps I was over reacting, just because of the way i saw them being taken out, I take a lot of time to repot them uproot them... so.. yea.
 
  • #10
i dont......i swear how i treat my plants would put some of you guys here into an epileptic fit.......
 
  • #11
Wow! I never knew Sarracenia was "also called Cobra Lilly cause they kinda look like a cobra"... :crazy: At least he was half right, it was a Sarracenia he was talking about... :D
 
  • #12
I thought it was a lil weird that he said the Nepenthes pitchers needed to be filled with water. I'm not sure where people get this idea from. :p

-Ben
 
  • #13
lol yeah, half full :0o: I'm not claiming to be some nep god or anything... Maybe that's why none of mine have been half full before :D When she was filling them up I was waiting for one to snap and fall over. :-))
 
  • #14
lol yeah, half full :0o: I'm not claiming to be some nep god or anything... Maybe that's why none of mine have been half full before :D When she was filling them up I was waiting for one to snap and fall over. :-))

thats why they re record it and they put it in the bloopers :O
 
  • #15
Haha yea I know. I find it so interesting that just because these plants are so different from the norm and so "mystical" and mysterious, people don't seem to really think logically when around these plants.

I mean seriously the lids are "decorative landing pads"?? Even I know that they are thought to keep out water, which would obviously mean that the don't want water to be poured into their traps!! Haha well whatever as long as I never meet them.

-Ben
 
  • #16
i dont know......most ppl usually dump the liquid out of the pitchers before shipping, when i recieve the plants i fill them half full of water to help keep them from getting dehydrated.........do the same thing at repotting, any empty or half full pitchers get filled...........
 
  • #17
I may put a squirt in... But I've never filled a 13" 'Miranda' pitcher half full of water... I'm not saying it'll hurt the plant (past ripping the pitcher from the tendril) but I've never seen one that full on it's own. or even close to it.
 
  • #18
was at work and didnt watch the whole video...........as i said....half full when empty will likely do more good than harm.........
 
  • #19
The average "professional gardener" believes the "fill the pitchers" mantra because the tags of the company that sells N. Miranda, N. Velvet, N. "alata" (actually N. Ventrata) tells you to do just that. I suppose filling them with water on those big hanging Nep baskets may keep the pitchers for a little while in normal household humidity. My aunt's Bachmanns flower shop gets them a few times a year-always the same hybrids though. :( These retail Nep baskets are grown in a greenhouse not a window with central heating and 20% humidity, so those big beautiful pitchers that are on it are not long for this world after bringing them home. Adding water MAY add longevity but decrease carnivorous effectiveness by diluting the acidity of the fluid. That said, once you get deep into Neps like I was you'll have showerstalls/grow areas with humidity sustaining equipment and don't have to think about that stuff. The only thing I added to any of my pitchers was a defrosted cricket every week or two (depending on size). Neps are challenge to get started but so worth it - though heartbreaking cos even with a shower stall you can't have a 6 foot diameter N. bical comfortably with other species competing for light. I hated selling my outsized monsters once they got big even though it meant I could do more plant shopping!

As far as Martha, the only episode I've seen on CPs with her was long before she was an ex-con! She interviewed James Pieterpaulo the author of Carnivorous Plants of the World. Years ago a lot of people accused this guy and his defunct nursery of being a poacher. I don't know if this was true or a rumor began out of jealousy buy rival nursery owners (not uncommon in the Orchid world) . But his book was nice to have when I first got it.
 
  • #20
huh, very cool! Thanks for the link!

She kind of goes nuts with that basket huh? Ive never seen that many plants put into a basket before lol, ah well....to each their own! Im thinking they put them in there so "neglectful" probably because of the time "crunch" for each segment. Hopefully they went back and worked em in a little better.


I was sad to see the sundews not so dewy. I was ready to laugh when she touched the dew, as I avoid touching mine...feels like sticky snot, scares the heck out of me for some reason lol!....I was prepared for a good reaction. oh well.

those are some pretty awsome neps though...hopefully Ill have somewhere to grow some in the future. :)
 
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