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Lowland nepenthes conditions

  • Thread starter trashcan
  • Start date

trashcan

O:-)
Hello,

I'm a long time Nepenthes grower but am recently struggling a bit to get the right conditions for my plants after switching to some more powerful lights (the old one broke). Some of my plants that were closer to intermediate than lowland died, and some others are suffering - slow growth, yellow leaves.

I'm not sure if the problem is having too much light (4 x 54w T5HO bulbs) or the heat they generate. I have put spacers between the terrarium and the lid to help bring the temps down, but have not yet changed the amount of time the lights are on. They come on at sunrise and turn off at sunset, so about 14 hours currently. I also added a fan on top of the hottest part of the lights to blow the heat away from the terrarium. Those changes resulted in the day time temps from peaking at 86-87F to 82-83F. The lows are a little more erratic but are close to 70-71. Humidity is at least 70% at night, and at least 60% during the day.

Does that sound pretty reasonable? You can see graphs of the temperature and humidity here if you are interested: https://my.wirelesstag.net/eth/tempStats.html?81d9ea5d-5989-4bff-b080-566ae909c240&Terrarium&F

According to this chart, most of my plants are ultralowland, lowland, or lowlands hybridized with intermediate. If it helps I currently have N. ampullaria, bicalcarata, albomarginata, ventricosa x mira, ventricosa x ovata, a plant I am wildly guessing is ampullaria x rafflesiana and a veitchii.

Thanks in advance for the help, let me know if pictures would help.
 
Those temperatures sound perfect. I would guess that too much light is your problem, though some pictures of the affected plants would help.
 
+1 to the above

Definitely possible that the plants burned when you upgraded lights, seeing as your conditions otherwise are spot on.
 
Ditto. My plants get warmer and dryer than that just fine. But I have had yellowing from too much light.
 
Lowland Nepenthes like and tend to expect temperatures that reach minimum the high 80's if not into the 90's F to do really well; lots of light generally isn't an issue with many but if combine with lower humidity can cause burning. If you have yellowing leaves and really slow growth I might wonder about the soil/water being used; too wet and many will rot, and yellowing or browning leaves can be a first sign, same with TDS in the soil or water being too high.
 
I realize this thread is old, but I have just recently moved to SW FL and have been reading conflicting reports about Nepenthes bicalcarata doing well outdoors here.
My climate is USDA 9b/10a and the last frost was is 2010. Typical day temps in December and January average in the high 70sF and average nightly lows are in the 60sF. There are dips into the high 30s and 40F rarely and these are short and followed by warm days.
I expect to offer protection below 70F during the day and 50F at night for longer than a passing blip.
I plan to grow mine under my pool enclosure, which is about 30% block in sunlight and this also offers some protection from wind and cold. I’ll have misting for the lower humidity in the winter.
Summers are in the 90sF during the day and high 70s, but typically mid 80sF at night. Humidity is uniformly high, but higher and with more rain during the Summer.
Humidity should never fall below 70%, especially with misting.

The plants I have are starter plants, hardened in a greenhouse.
 
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