I'm also in the DC area and agree with the suggestion to repot
your VFT in peat. I rescued a small one in early spring from a
plastic tomb (2.5" pot with a plastic dome) and planted it in
a 6" pot in pure peat. The plant is in a deep tray of water
and gets about 4 hours of direct sun a day - it's gone crazy.
It's putting up at least one new trap a week and the edges of
the traps are now outside the pot (plant diameter is about 6.5"
and the traps are about 1"). The traps are not as red as I'd
like but they seem to be catching their share of bugs.
Pure peat seems to work well for starting VFT seeds too. I got
a bunch of seed from someone on the net and planted them in
another pot in the same tray. I covered the seed with plastic
just until the first green color appeared and the seedlings
seem to be growing quickly. They were planted around the 7th
and and are getting ready to put up their first traps.
Speaking of red VFTs, if anyone has one of the "all red" VFTs
that they're interested in trading for, please let me know.
Dave
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David Purks
Alcatel Data Networks
uunet!telenet.com!dkpurks