Date: Fri, 28 May 1999 08:11:36 -0600 From: "John Green" <HPJGREEN@ihc.com> To: cp@opus.hpl.hp.com Message-Id: <aabcdefg1880$foo@default> Subject: RE: caterpillar damage
>Just a note, you may already be aware of this. I have had trouble with
>caterpillars in the past with Sarrs. I have found that if you
carefully
>search through the medium (in my case live sphagnum) you will
eventually
>find the culprit. In most cases they hide during the day and come up
out
>of the ground at night to feed.
>I had a similar problem with S. purpurea and plunged the plant in a
bucket
>of water overnight, entirely submersing it and weighing it down. I
also
>covered the container. The plant is too big for a critter to eat a
whole
>leaf, but there was nightly damage. Three medium size green
caterpillars
>that hid in the pitchers during the day were the problem.
Last night while inspecting my plants I found a small caterpillar
hiding *inside* a small pitcher. I hadn't even noticed the damage he
was doing to some small sarrs till then. If I hadn't seen his little
head poke out of the leaf while I was sitting there, who knows how much
he'd have eaten before I caught him. I fed him to a D. capensis.
John Green
Salt Lake City, Utah
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