Re: CP stuff
Don (dngess01@vlsi.ct.louisville.edu)
Wed, 19 Aug 92 00:08:03 -0400
Regarding Sarracenia under flourescent lights - it would be more difficult
as most Sarracenia grow best in full sunlight and they require dormancy in
winter. A good beginner's species would a tropical drosera like
D. capensis, binata, aliciae, adelae, montana, spatulata. These grow easily
from root cuttings that can be supplied by just about any of the people
in this group for free. For a soil, you can use plain peat moss and perlite
(about 1:1). Don't use the Hyponex peat moss (I've bought a bag of this
before and it looks strange - black instead of the usual brown powder and
it will decay and start stinking soon when kept constantly moist). Also,
don't use 'peat', which is broken-down peat moss.
As for fertilizing CP, I wouldn't try root fertilizers on any of the plants
as it would change the pH and break down the soil. Fertilizer is generally
not needed since it is fairly risky as some CP are more sensitive to
it than others. Also, many of the tropical drosera are fast growers and
will flower from seed in only about 4-6 months anyway.
I don't believe Roridula is an honest-to-goodness CP in the sense that it
uses the caught insects to add nutrients to the plant, but it does have
'dewy' leaves like a drosera and is capable of trapping quite a few
insects. The stem of the common petunia is also 'dewy' and is capable
of trapping very small gnats too.