Sundews on speed

[LLeopardGGecko]

I have a small (but incredibly fast growing) colony of D. burmannii in a fish bowl terrarium, just chillin' under a single 23 watt compact flourescent bulb, lovin' every second of it. Before I continue, you must understand that the reason I pursued getting this plant into my collection is because of its alleged super-quick moving tentacles. Until this point, the plants have been too small to feed. Very recently I decided that they were big enough to start feeding...FEED ME SEYMOUR! FEED ME NOW!

...Sorry, I got carried away there. I think I played "Little Shop of Horrors" one too many times

Anyways, I decide to feed my little sundews some bugs, and...how do I say this...WOW! You can actually see the tentacles move in towards the prey, and it's not slow. Just amazing to see in action. Here I was thinking that D. scorpiodes was the fastest in my collection. Boy was I wrong! Yes, that plant is very fast at overpowering an insect, but I think it comes in at a close second to D. burmannii.

Dang, just when I think I have a permanent favorite sundew, one of my other sundews comes along and does something incredible like this. Ah, the rough life of a CP grower

 

[PiranhaPlant]

My burmannii is still too small to feed it, my byblis is younger than the burmannii and already it has 15 leaves

 

[chloroplast]

My D.burmanii are almost big enough to feed--can't wait.

 

[LLeopardGGecko]

You're going to love it - TRUST me!

 

[Gemini528]

How big does burmanii have to be before it can be fed?

 

[PiranhaPlant]

The byblis is hogging all the sunlight and I think I see a flower stalk forming, I hope it is

. Can the flower stalk also digest insects?

 

[Dimka]

I think I'll have to try getting some of those... burmanii seems to be so popular around here...

 

[LLeopardGGecko]

Quote[/b] ]How big does burmanii have to be before it can be fed?

I think my plants were around a month to a month and a half old when I started feeding them. I'm sure you can feed them before that, but the bugs would have to be VERY small.

 

[Gemini528]

Hmm... I think I'll wait until spring. Right now, they don't have any nice growth, and they're still pretty small. Thanks!

 

[CopcarFC]

Yeah they are quick. Whenever I feed my seelings a bloodworm/fish food meal, within minuets the leaves are completly folded.

-Rail

 

[LLeopardGGecko]

Hey Copcar, what kind of fish food do you use to feed your sundews? I'm thinking about trying it. Will any ol' fish food work?

 

[CopcarFC]

I use Tetrafin Goldfish Flakes, I figure you could use anything. But I saw much more of a reaction by mixing it with bloodworms and crushing it all to a powder. My seedling D. Capensis absolutly LOVE it. I get new, larger leaves the day after feeding every time.

-Rail

 

[LLeopardGGecko]

Ok, thanks Copcar. I'll definitely have to try it.

 

[fischerCP]

Does the D Burmanni die off, and do you have to grow from seed each year?
Jeff

 

[Odysseus]

In my experience D. burmannii acts more like an annual where after flowering it usually dies and then I grow again from seed. But, this has only been a couple years of growing, not enough to say that it is the "norm" for burmannii.

 

[LLeopardGGecko]

This is only my first time growing D. burmannii so I'll have to get back to you on that. From what I've heard it dies after it flowers.