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Refilling pitchers with water?

Ok so I've been reading about feeding my Neps, and I just went out and bought some freeze dried bloodworms. I was planning on feeding some to my new Neps that I just received, but they do not have anymore digestive fluid in them due to shipping or what not. If I just fill the pitchers up with some water will that act as digesting fluid, or do the plants have some special formula that they make for themselves? Also, if I do this, how full do the digestive fluids usually fill the pitchers? 1/4? 1/2? less? more? Thanks for any replies!!

Zach
 
You don't really need to fill them up yourself, because the plant is designed to secrete the digestive juices and whatnot by itself. :)
 
I read that some people use koi pellets.
 
no, sometimes a plant will come with instructions to fill the pitchers 2/3 full of water but that is to make the pitchers last longer for the seller. It dilutes the digestive juices in the pitcher.
 
If it's completely empty I usally add a squirt or two of water...
 
Most pitchers (from my personal observations and readings) are about 1/3 full of liquid. Refilling them will help them last longer upon arrival, and will help with the enzyme production to break down "food."

The liquid in pitchers is sterile when it opens, and will secrete the enzymes when the pitcher is shaken or jiggled (like a bug moving around inside) so having water inside will be a good starting point.

If you are doing it for fertilization sakes, you might want to read Clint's advice on how he fertilizes through the pitchers in this thread.

xvart.
 
Yeah, I fertilize the pitchers instead of the roots. IME, the media breaks down faster when I fertilize the media, and I'm an LFS fanboy and won't change media hehe. If I had a large collection, I'd have to switch to a different media as fertilizing the pitchers would become impractical. To me, it seems reasonable to think that feeding via the pitchers would be better than the roots, but they both work well and I don't know which is better for the plant. No one has done a real study AFAIK.

When you get it, if you fertilize, just fill them up as per usual. If not, just use RO water and superthrive if you want (I add superthrive to my fertilizer anyway). If you don't fertilize, don't continually add water to the pitchers to keep them "full" because there's no reason for it beyond that first time, and if they can catch insects you'll screw up the balance inside the pitchers. Don't fill them up with water and then add blood worms. Fertilize. Fertilize. Fertilize. Why don't people fertilize these days? I month or so ago I was telling someone to fertilize, and they thought I was joking and being sarcastic, because they thought it would spell death for their plant.
 
Why don't people fertilize these days?

Because there is still tons of information way down deep in all the forums about fertilizing being terrible so when any newbie comes along they see it all over the place.

xvart.
 
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