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U. longifolia

My U. longifolia has obviously got problems.  Does this species need very intense light?  I recently moved mine closer to the lights, and it seems to exacerbate this weird problem:

20031029-CP-U.longifolia,%20volunteer%20D.muscipula-disease.jpg


This is after pulling off the worst affected leaves/stolons.

One big surprise i had while i taking a cutting was this:
20031029-CP-The%20stowaway%20VFT-U.longifolia,%20volunteer%20D.muscipula.jpg


That's a little VFT there in the middle.  How it got there, i have no idea.  I've heard of longifolia being a bit invasive, but this is a strange turn of events. Pretty trippy.

So, any thoughts on new things to try?  Cool air, warm air, dimmer lights, brighter lights.  Only thing i haven't tried is new media, but i find it hard to believe that will make a difference, since it DOES grow, after all.
 
I am going to shoot straight from the hip on this one: that plant looks like it has a viral infection. Ditch it and seek a new start of this species before it infects your other plants.

Second opinions anyone?
 
They look like my nep leaves when they hit the top of my terrium and begin to burn from the heat of the lights. You might have placed the pot too close to the lights and the heat is burning them. Just my thoughts.
 
I'm tipping a viral or fungal infection as well. I doubt whether light levels are the problem. If it was too much light or heat I would expect the tips of the stolons to be burnt rather than lower down. It may be wise to take Tamlins advice and ditch the plant. You don't want this problem to spread to any of your other plants.

Sean.
 
Oh dear. I've had this plant for almost a year now. It would be hard to just toss it. I'm going to put it away from the rest of the plants in very low lighting and give it one last chance.

If it's a fungal or viral infection, there's no way to get a sterile start from a cutting, is there?

I wasn't aware of any viral diseases for CPs. Are these things specific to genus, species, family, or what?
 
My longis get this now and again, I don't think it is viral. Best bet is to make a small division that looks clean and keep it from the main plant then you are going to be real hard on the mother. Dry the mother pot till it has almost no moisture (LFS is dry but still springy.) Keep it this way for at least a week but the longer you can hold it there the better, I did a month. After the drying return to the tray and increase water slowly. What ever this is it seems to avoid the stolons and this technique kills off the damaged leaves and keep any new ones from springing up and geting what ever this is.
 
Greetings,

Pyro's advice sounds worth trying.  I had this problem with a 'dwarf' form of longifolia about five months ago.  About the same time there was another post on this board about purplish brown blotches on longifolia leaves, and a possible virus being the culprit.  I freaked out and removed the plant from my collection and put it on the roof of my apartment building-thinking I would come back later and dispose of it.  

And there it remained for several weeks (no rain, no attention, no love).  I stumbled upon it quite by accident (trying to get pics of the full-moon over the downtown skyline) and noticed that it was still alive.  Feeling like I had nothing to lose, I watered it.  And hullo! it flowered!  Just one, but it was enough for me to puff my chest for two weeks. The plants seems to have reovered nicely and is quite vigorous.

Two lessons I learned:

1) One can't put too much importance on a quarintine and observation period for traded/purchased plants

And

2) Sometimes a little abuse can be a good thing-no risk no glory.

Peace,
Damon
 
hey,
I would not pitch it just yet. I think it is probably over-lighting. My plant was fine on a summer south facing window, but when the sun got more direct in fall it began getting purple streaks/ blotches. I now have it in my terrerium and new leaves are growing in in abundace(without splotches).

Hope this helps,

Cole
 
Thanks everyone, in particular Pyro. I don't know how you came up with that, but that's great. The question is, don't the spores fall into the soil and then just reinfect the plant? What kind of disease could this be?

efbiosis, that plant you saw before was most likely mine. I've posted before asking about it, and never got so many helpful responses. Guess it pays to be a pest.
wink.gif
 
  • #10
My observations are similar to Cole's. My U. longifolia growing in direct sunlight gets blotches on the older leaves similar to that in the photo. However, leaves of my longifolia grown out of direct sunlight tend to not get the blotches. Also, the leaves that get blotches seem to be most common when growing from compost above water; those leaves that emerge from the water bowl tend not to get blotches. This leads me to guess that the blotches might be a result of cellular water stress during periods when evaporation is high -- that is it is less common in the shade and in leaves where the stolen is submerged under water.
 
  • #11
Just in case you want more advice, I would say that your medium is too old. Take a cutting and restart the colony and chuck the rest. I had this in a few other big-leaved species and when I tipped them out of their pots, I found that the medium reeked of anaerobic decomposition and most of the plant had rotted away.
 
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