Fertilizing

[TazZduDe54]

I know that it's not reccomended to fertilize your VFT, but I've heard of people fertilizing theirs. If you've fertilized, what kind did you use? Did it make your plant improve? By the way.. I have a baby Common Venus Fly Trap and I added a fertilizing stick to the soil and it's doing excellent! I already see two new leaves coming up that appeared about two days after I fertilized it! Since I live in Texas, I don't generally place it in direct sun so I really don't have too much of an advantage to getting the mouths red. But, I noticed that it's begining to become more red inside the mouth and I have it in full shade most of the day.

 

[Guest]

I would remove the fertilizer sticks from the plant's soil.

As far as the plant goes, they aren't real tolerant of fertilizers, and even if it were applied, it would have to be weak doses...and not too often.

The best things that you can do for the plant is:

1) good light
2) right water
3) no people/pet food
4) dormancy ( when needed )

The Venus Flytrap's roots are fragile and cannot take fertilizing. The roots will burn and the plant will suffer. Too much and the plant might die.

The best thing to do is feed the plant bugs. That is what it has evolved to do. It lives ( in the wild ) in areas that are nutrient poor, so it adapted to catch bugs to supplement what other plants get.
With that, came the intolerance for soil that is fertile.

So, if you think about it, bugs are the 'fertilizer' for the plant.

So giving it some, will help, but giving it a lot will hurt it