My Venus Fly Traps in Full Swing
I mentioned before in my tutorial of making a growing medium for carnivorous plants that I grow Carnivorous Plants (CPs). I also said that it is quite challenging growing them as plant development is really slow. Among the species however, I found Venus Fly Traps as the easiest to grow, at least for me.
I've known Venus Fly Traps (VTFs) since I was a kid, but I hadn't seen a live one until five years ago. Yes, you read it right. I was only able to see a live VFT when I am already in New Zealand during a visit in one of the garden centers. I found it fascinating to see them entrap an insect and eventually digest it like what we do with food. Since then, I decided that I will grow and propagate VTFs. I started with a single plant then which lived for just about a month. Rookie mistake. I then bought another one, I managed to make it live for more than a year, but my excitement to feed it more than it can consume lead eventually to its death. Death by overfeeding. The death of that second plant made me realize that growing VFTs is not the same as with other plants. So I read online resources and guides how to properly grow VFTs and I can confidently say that I am able to grow them now successfully.
VFTs go dormant during winter. Some of them wilt you'll think they are dying. As it is already spring here in New Zealand, my VFTs are now awake and starting to embrace the warming weather. The following images are my VFTs waking up to the spring weather.
These four (4) VFTs are originally part of a single plant, which I subdivided before the start of autumn this year. Judging from the photos, I think they are fully established now given that they are able to produce flowers. The mother plant is already two years old, so I consider them to be of the same age.
This plant was given to me by another carnivorous plants hobbyist. It is probably more than two years old, as this was given to me a couple of years back and it is already a mature plant when I got it.
This one has grown from seed. I didn't plant this, it just germinated from a seed pod that dried and fell onto the base of the plant above (the VFT that was given to me).
I do have another set of VFTs, on a garden patch but I will show their photos in another post - about that particular garden patch.
In about two weeks, I will have more VFTs because I will be subdividing those which can be subdivided. Right now, that's my quickest way of propagating VFTs. There are some other ways which I will cover in another post.
That's all for now folks and I hope you enjoyed my sharing of how my VFTs are doing at the moment. Feel free to leave your comment below.
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I read your article on how to make the growing mix and found it very helpful. I am a big fan of pumice, as it does not float like perlite tends to do when I add water.
I watched a video saying sundews do better outside in the sun than they so indoors by a window, and it totally flopped. I had I it in a shady nook by a shrub in late Spring, and it looked like the sun steam cooked it one day.
Next time, I might start over and try your grow mix, and use a jar to build a mini terrarium. I seem to get a lot of success rehabilitating plants under cool, bright, humid conditions.
Hi, thank you for your comment. It's nice to see someone here in Steem with the same hobby as mine. And yes, feel free to try my medium mix. While I can't guarantee 100% that it will work for ALL CPs, here's what I planted in that medium so far and they thrive well.
Thanks for sharing:)