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Hi Alexander, Yes, the top dressing is pine needles. As I have never performed a controlled comparison, I do not know if the plant benefits directly but I do know that the pine needles slow down the development of moss on the surface and that some dense mosses seem to have a detrimental affect on speed of plant growth. I have grown VFT in pine needles in the past: https://www.flytrapcare.com/phpBB3/vft-growing-in-pine-needles-t12841.html

This is genuine "Big Boy" with provenance back to the originator:

@jcz, for nearly all of my Cephalotus I stand them in a tray of water, topping it up when it empties. I've done this for many years and the only problem I have occasionally had is in colder months when keeping them too wet can cause some black mildew issues. The one growing in perlite and Seramis is purely an experiment.

I set up a little trial using perlite and Seramis as a media in a wicking system. Seems to be doing OK so far.

I like clones with distinctive pitcher shapes, such as Squat and Bananito. They are much easier to distinguish than so-called dark clones which need specific conditions to realise their characteristic.

New cultivar, Cephalotus follicularis ‘Squat’. Deserving of cultivar status in my mind as its pitcher shape is very distinctive. https://cpn.carnivorousplants.org/articles/CPNv50n2p87_91.pdf?fbclid=IwAR39SwYzPtovj0yCo--oyR64mibcznV2r4PoYWdPy_Yz2OYld2OrG4ZT2T0

Yes, it reminds me of the shape of a boot

Cephalotus 'bananito' pitchers are much more elongated.

How long have you owned the plant? Have you changed the growing conditions? What is your watering routine?

I always found it strange that John Hummer failed to mention the wide mid rib as a defining character in the cultivar description.

The ISHS states 'The ICRA should try to ensure that the registrant is prompted into giving an account of characteristics that are likely to be diagnostic. Descriptive information recorded will vary greatly between some denomination classes.' Personally, I don't think the the cultivar registration of Hummer's Giant is particularly descriptive and I do not believe it to be sufficient to allow differentiation of the clone.

Some years ago I received a HG from a UK growers, who had been growing it for many years and I believe that it was distributed throughout Europe as HG, but it has a different picther shape than those I have seen in the US. As I mentioned before, there may have been more than one clone distributed by John Hummer as HG and I also think that there are a lot of mislabelled ones out there too.

I'm not sure that anyone knows what the true Hummer's Giant looks like, as the cultivar description does not describe the shape. In addition, it suggests that John Hummer may have distributed more than one clone with the same name. The cultivar description can be found here: http://www.carnivorousplants.org/cpn/Species/v29n4p116_122.html#hummers Here you can find pictures of what people have called Hummer's Giant, but you will see that there are some variances: https://cpphotofinder.com/cephalotus-hummers-giant-2011.html @dimitar might be able to help with identification, as he has quite a keen eye for Cephalotus shapes.

To be honest, the cultivar description for Hummer's Giant is dreadful and I don't think anyone could say with confidence that they have the plant described in the description.

In my experience, it is not a good addition to Cephalotus mix. You would be better to use perlite. The only CP I use vermiculite on is Mexican pinguicula.