Fw: Nepenthes mix
saharris@iafrica.com
Mon, 03 Jun 96 02:02:14 GMT
Hi!
I have been fascinated reading of the different mixes used for
Nepenthes,
stuck at the tip of Africa, I experimented with a variety of substances,
peat moss (live and milled) imported expensively, keeps the roots too
wet, the only live sphagnum I have seen, grows at Hermanus, amongst the
D. slackii, and that is only +-20cm thick, with sand and rock below it,
I have tried fern fibre from Knysna similiar to osmunda, but it tends to
pack too closely. Some 10 years ago I read Robert Cantley's catalogue
with it's amazing Nepenthes, and there he mentions growing them in wood
shavings, I bought bags of oak shavings, sifting out the finer dust,
which is why the majority buy it, distributing it to family members for
smoking meat, fish etc. It worked like a dream, for a few years, and
then a fungus attacked the shavings, Benlate kept it in check, I then
tried meranti, pine etc. shavings which had been treated for woodborer,
fungii etc, tentitively!! it worked fantastically, I could get it for
nothing from the local wood-joiners in huge bags, I am now fussy in that
I only use shavings from the wood-planer, which produce "planks" roughly
(extremely roughly) .5-1mm thick 8cm long and 10mm wide. I now grow all
my Neps (50 plus species/hybrids) in pure wood shavings with a regular
foliar feed. I have the odd problems with fungus now and again, oak I
suppose???
ALL THE BEST Eric Green