Hello. I'm fairly new to plant care in general, and the carnivorous plants i recently bought and planted in a long planter box are doing pretty well in my opinion (i.e. growing new traps/flowers), but i have a few main concerns...
Let me first give some background info in case it helps:
The place i bought these plants from was basically a greenhouse, and they had all their CPs submerged in 1/4" or so of what looked like standing "swamp" water (lots of algae), and they said some of the plants were just coming out of dormancy. the plants weren't all labeled, but the varieties i know i have are: cape sundew, scarlet belle, venus flytrap, and i believe a purple pitcher plant...the far left and the middle plant (trumpet pitcher?) i'm not sure of.
Note: since i unfortunately don't presently know the exact names of all 6 plants, i'll be referring to them below by number (1-6, from left to right, as seen in the pics of the whole planter).
i planted them using 2 different varieties of sphagnum peat moss (one was dark and very finely grounded, the other was light and stringy--but made sure that neither had any fertilizers in them), mixed w/ sand (in a mixture of about 1.5:1 moss:sand), and made sure the mixture was wet (using distilled water) before i potted the plants. The plants haven't been outside yet (except for once or twice during the daytime in an attempt to get them some full, unfiltered sunlight), as it's still a little too cold at night here in Philadelphia. my plan is to wait until the daily "low" is consisently above 50 (at least), then hang them from a planter rack on my balcony. in the meantime, they've mostly been in the windowsill pictured, which admittedly doesn't get direct sunlight, but again, they seem to be growing new traps rather quickly. Oh, and there is also a streetlamp directly outside my window (see picture) that lights up our parking lot--all i know is that it's some type of flourescent bulb...probably doesn't help the plants all that much, tho maybe a little. Also note that the substrate you see in the pictures is not a good representation of the substrate i used throughout--after i was done putting the mix in and planting my CPs, i just put a very thin layer of one variety of straight peat moss across the top, mainly because i had a little bit left in the bag, and for appearance.
So, my questions are as follows, BASED ON THE PICTURES BELOW...
1) what should i do about the giant stalks/pitchers on the middle plant (plant # 4, actually in the middle-right)?...they must've been there from the previous year(s), but as you can see, they've grown so long that they're leaning down, further & further towards the ground--i personally love that they're this long and i'd really like to keep them (as long as it can't hurt the rest of the plant)...can i leave them hanging/sagging, or should i try to gradually prop them up so that they'll eventually stand more vertically on their own?
2) I've been rotating the planter 180 degrees every two days or so (basically flipping it around), thinking this will help the taller plants to grow straight up, rather than them all leaning in one direction because the sun only hits that one side. Is this a good practice, bad practice, or indifferent?
3) What should i do with individual pitchers/traps that are in each of the following conditions:
a. completely blackened (like on the VFT)?
b. somewhat brown towards the top of the pitcher (like the tips of plant # 6 & the lids on the really tall pitchers on plant #4)?
c. have holes in the pitcher, likely from bugs eating through them (like the one long pitcher on #4 that i took a closeup of)?
4) it looks like someone clipped a lot of growth off of the plants--now, i know you're supposed to clip some traps in relation to dormancy, but i just wanted to make sure... notice all the little brown "nubs" at the bottom of plants 2, 3 (especially), and 4 (can be seen in the last photo in each plant's set of pics) ...Is this normal?
5) i thought that cape sundew traps were supposed to curl upwards towards the sky... mine are all curled downwards towards the ground... Is this a problem?
Thanks in advance for any advice/input you're able to provide!!...
Here's the pics:
Pics of the whole planter...
Plant # 1...
Plant # 2...
Plant # 3...
Plant # 4...
Plant # 5...
Plant # 6...
Thanks again!!
Let me first give some background info in case it helps:
The place i bought these plants from was basically a greenhouse, and they had all their CPs submerged in 1/4" or so of what looked like standing "swamp" water (lots of algae), and they said some of the plants were just coming out of dormancy. the plants weren't all labeled, but the varieties i know i have are: cape sundew, scarlet belle, venus flytrap, and i believe a purple pitcher plant...the far left and the middle plant (trumpet pitcher?) i'm not sure of.
Note: since i unfortunately don't presently know the exact names of all 6 plants, i'll be referring to them below by number (1-6, from left to right, as seen in the pics of the whole planter).
i planted them using 2 different varieties of sphagnum peat moss (one was dark and very finely grounded, the other was light and stringy--but made sure that neither had any fertilizers in them), mixed w/ sand (in a mixture of about 1.5:1 moss:sand), and made sure the mixture was wet (using distilled water) before i potted the plants. The plants haven't been outside yet (except for once or twice during the daytime in an attempt to get them some full, unfiltered sunlight), as it's still a little too cold at night here in Philadelphia. my plan is to wait until the daily "low" is consisently above 50 (at least), then hang them from a planter rack on my balcony. in the meantime, they've mostly been in the windowsill pictured, which admittedly doesn't get direct sunlight, but again, they seem to be growing new traps rather quickly. Oh, and there is also a streetlamp directly outside my window (see picture) that lights up our parking lot--all i know is that it's some type of flourescent bulb...probably doesn't help the plants all that much, tho maybe a little. Also note that the substrate you see in the pictures is not a good representation of the substrate i used throughout--after i was done putting the mix in and planting my CPs, i just put a very thin layer of one variety of straight peat moss across the top, mainly because i had a little bit left in the bag, and for appearance.
So, my questions are as follows, BASED ON THE PICTURES BELOW...
1) what should i do about the giant stalks/pitchers on the middle plant (plant # 4, actually in the middle-right)?...they must've been there from the previous year(s), but as you can see, they've grown so long that they're leaning down, further & further towards the ground--i personally love that they're this long and i'd really like to keep them (as long as it can't hurt the rest of the plant)...can i leave them hanging/sagging, or should i try to gradually prop them up so that they'll eventually stand more vertically on their own?
2) I've been rotating the planter 180 degrees every two days or so (basically flipping it around), thinking this will help the taller plants to grow straight up, rather than them all leaning in one direction because the sun only hits that one side. Is this a good practice, bad practice, or indifferent?
3) What should i do with individual pitchers/traps that are in each of the following conditions:
a. completely blackened (like on the VFT)?
b. somewhat brown towards the top of the pitcher (like the tips of plant # 6 & the lids on the really tall pitchers on plant #4)?
c. have holes in the pitcher, likely from bugs eating through them (like the one long pitcher on #4 that i took a closeup of)?
4) it looks like someone clipped a lot of growth off of the plants--now, i know you're supposed to clip some traps in relation to dormancy, but i just wanted to make sure... notice all the little brown "nubs" at the bottom of plants 2, 3 (especially), and 4 (can be seen in the last photo in each plant's set of pics) ...Is this normal?
5) i thought that cape sundew traps were supposed to curl upwards towards the sky... mine are all curled downwards towards the ground... Is this a problem?
Thanks in advance for any advice/input you're able to provide!!...
Here's the pics:
Pics of the whole planter...
Plant # 1...
Plant # 2...
Plant # 3...
Plant # 4...
Plant # 5...
Plant # 6...
Thanks again!!