nepenthes mistake
Nexus User djohnson (djohnson@nexus.edu.au)
Fri, 25 Nov 1994 13:36:07 +1030
I recently hed a problem with Botritis in mt collection of nepenthes. I
had tried other fungicides like benlate and fongorid without success. A
friend of mine suggested that I should try copper-oxy-chloride which he
had used on his friut trees. I had found that Nepenthes are relatively
tough plants when compared to other carnivores in my collection so I
gave it a go. BIG MISTAKE!!. Within a week the pitchers began to go
brown and die as did the crowns. Some of the tougher plants like N.
alata N. ventricosa N. tobica and a number of other highland hybrids
have now recovered buy are still only producing the odd small pitcher
while the slower species and hybrids are yet to form a single leaf. A
large N. mirabilis ' echinostoma' never recovered from the spray and
lucily it was the only fatality in the collection but a number of my
favourite plants like ane extremely dark , almost black form of N.
maxima will take years to recover. The moral of this storey is 'be
careful with any chemicals that you are unsure of and always try them on
someone else's plants first. If this is not possible then test then on
cheaper plants of your own.