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Everything posted by Rob-Rah
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new way of water propagation-----in sugar water!!
Rob-Rah replied to JustLikeAPill's topic in Propagation
You could soak some old potatoes in warm rainwater and then spit into it. That will provide amylase to break down the potato starch into glucose. Then again, maybe not the most refined way of going abuot things. -
I grow two clones, which are in 5" square plastic mesh pots (for marginals in ponds I think), in a mix of sphagnum moss and perlite. They get watered whenever the soil is drying out on top - every day or two in summer, and less often in winter. I find growth is quicker in the cooler winter (when it's kept above 10C) than in summer time. The soil doesn't dry out as quickly in winter, and the plants get higher winter humidity due to lower temperatures. I don't provide a dormancy deliberately, although maybe my plants think summer is semi-dormancy-time due to higher temperature and less moisture. They are in sun diffused through greenhouse whitewash. I have a feeling that more diffused and semi-shaded conditions might be preferred, and I will experiment a bit over the future. I haven't been immensely successful with flowering it though, although one currently has a flower stem on it still growing. Maybe this will open later in the season...
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The number of rods in half a furlong plus the number of inches making the depth of a bushel. --- I first grew a vft and killed it, and so then tried a sarracenia flava and managed to kill that. Not enough light in retrospect. That was when I was about 10. I started "properly" at about age 16, after a good study of Slack's first book and Cheers's little volume, using our frost-free porch as the main growing area, and have been growing successfully (more or less) ever since. Some of my plants are the same ones I had when I was 16 (vft, and many of the sarras). The collection has been getting more expansive in the last five years or so due to getting better paid jobs and a thorough overhaul and renovation of the greenhouse, adding heating etc.
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What compost was it in? Heliamphora can be grown quite happily in water - I have a tray with the water sometimes up to halfway up the 4" pots, and my H. nutans in a 5" pot has been in 2" of water for the last 18 months (yes, even over winter). If you are going to water on the tray system it is important to have an open compost based on sphagnum moss (which assists against microbes) and also to water overhead in addition to keep the media fresh. If you use a peaty or otherwise compactable compost, then rot is likely with the tray system. As can be seen on the pics on Wistuba's website, some helis can happily grow partially submerged. It's a question not of water, but of avoiding stagnation.
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Technically, I guess. However, I have found that after a while many of my Mexican pings produce a kind of woody sub-trunk/stem (1/2 to 1cm in length) from which the rosettes spring, which does look kinda rhizome-like.
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I forgot to mention, one of the "Postcards" on the World of Pinguicula site shows U. livida growing in wet moss overlaying rock if that's any help: http://a-world-of-pinguicula.webheberg.com...Postcard_12.htm
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I use London tapwater in mine, which has a filter in it which allegedly removes some of the chemicals that would otherwise make the water hard. It doesn't work ideally though, and the ultrosonic head needs cleaning with vinegar or limescale remover every 6 months or so. That said, there is no limescale deposit on anything in the greenhouse so the filter must be doing something.
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There are some nice pics of various pinguicula growing lithophytically, in Europe and Mexico, along with descriptions, on the fantastic "A World of Pinguicula" website.
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Drosera schizandra & prolifera photos
Rob-Rah replied to sundewmatt's topic in Carnivorous Plants in Cultivation
I'm going to ask a dull question I frequently ask...... what size pot does each of these species require to do well? Deep or shallow? Cheers! -
If you gently stroke the OUTSIDE of the trap lobes (use finger and thumb), the trap will then work itself closed as you stroke. Anyone know what's going on there?
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I agree with that, not that I'm all that experienced. All my pings were in a peat/perlite/sand/vermiculite/gravel mix and they were sooooo slow to get away this year. Last week I created a new mix of crushed oystershell, vemiculite, grit and quite a lot of that absorbent ceramic material used for aquarium filters (chunks from 0.5cm to 2cm across - they were sold at about 2cm diameter and I put them in a bucket and had at them with a big hammer). I repotted many pings into this. All the plants suddently seem to be making roots into it and are so much happier than before. That said, my laueana is still in succulent rosette, although the roots being formed suggest that this won't last long now. I am going to buy some more of the large chunks of the ceramic, and try to find the smaller pieces (called aqualit???) this weekend, and make up a batch of the mix for future use. It also looks very attractive in the pots - naturalistic. I still want to try that tufa-growing method for gypsicola that Steve uses.
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I grow my cephs in the water trays (1-2" of water) the same as all the other regular CPs. Like Bob, I use a (big, 8") clay pot which might be affecting things.
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Righty. Having considered more deeply, I have decided to sell my lidless mutant and make space for more 'conventional' plants. Please go here: http://www.cpukforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=42848#42848 Cheers!
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My p. laueana and p. hemiepiphytica are not showing signs of summer foliage yet. Moranensis has just started looking like it's ready for summer now, and gigantea was a couple of weeks back. Maybe it's this odd protracted spring we're getting this year.....
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A more interesting highland setup...
Rob-Rah replied to Jamesemt's topic in Terraria - Cultivation & Equipment
You can make moss-pot-type-things by lining a loose wire-mesh frame with newspaper and then planting into sphagnum moss. As the newspaper decays the moss grows through it and covers up the wire. Simon, at Treesmill Tropicals seems to use kind of moss-pots (http://www.treesmilltropicals.co.uk) - maybe he will pop in and suggest something. You can pick up nice old logs where God leaves them lying around for free: woodland. Try to find one witohut signs of rot or full of woodlice. I would suggest you first soak said log in water to try and drive out any wee beasties inhabiting it. Next sterilise it in an oven to kill anything else. It might then finally be soaked with anti-rot compounds. A little hassle I guess, but infinitely cheaper than trying to buy it ready-done (have you seen the price of driftwood in garden centres? DRIFTWOOD, I ask you???). Best wishes. -
A more interesting highland setup...
Rob-Rah replied to Jamesemt's topic in Terraria - Cultivation & Equipment
Someone recently posted some pics of their big lowland terraium setup over on pft (USA). Have a look at this for "naturalistic"! http://www.petflytrap.com/cgi-bin/ib312/ik...0;entry118051 Wouldn't it be nice to be able to have the space to do something like that......[/url] -
Cornuta has little leaves, like most terrestrial utrics (http://www.moorbeet.de/Pfl_Seiten/utri.htm for example). I don't know jucea so well, but I think that has small leaves too (http://www.sarracenia.com/photos1/ujunc02.jpg and http://www.humboldt.edu/~rrz7001/zphotos/U_juncea.html). The only common(ish) plant I know with grass-like leaves and tall scapes of yellow flowers would be praelonga, a pic of which I posted a few days ago from my greenhouse: Is that the same as your plant? The giveaway (for me) is that praelonga produces two types of leaves, one tall and grass-like, the other smaller and flat, at the very base of the plant (http://www.humboldt.edu/~rrz7001/zphotos/U_praelonga.html).
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Mine came from a B&Q where is was extremely drought-stressed, but the old pitchers looked normal. Once I got it growing again, it started producing these deformed pitchers. I cut mine back to the base. The offshoots at the base started off producing normal pitchers, then started producing the deformed ones again. I am not sure what one can do. I will wait a while and see if gradual de-stressing the plant helps. It might be genetic, although the fact that the old dried out pitchers in B&Q were normal leads me to perplexion. The next step I wil take will be trying to root cuttings of the basal shoots before they get deformed.
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Do you mean like this? Sometimes there is a residual lid formed of a thin stting-like thing about a cm long?
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Sounds and looks a little like like praelonga. Are there also smaller leaves hidden down at soil level?
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Where did the exoleta originate from? Does it have "leaves" or not? Compare the pics on http://www.humboldt.edu/~rrz7001/ and then get back to us with your conclusions.
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Where can I find a list of what pings want acid and what want basic media? I am growing moranensis caudata, hemiepiphytica, laueana, gracilis (thanks Vic!), gigantea, vallisneriifolia, grandiflora and longifolia longifolia. and none of them seem to be terribly thriving for me - I suspect the soil is unsuitable. I know that vallisneriifolia wants basic media (I am going to try out a sand/perlite/grit/vermiculite/oystershell/cat-litter mix), but what of the other lithophytes? Any input gratefully received.
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The Lonelyplanet guide describes Czech weather thus: Maximum temps appear to be around 30C, whereas the summer average is more like 15-25C.
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I think U. exoleta is the same as U. gibba, which I grow in an icecream tub. A layer of peat is on the bottom, then topped up with water, and the plant floats. It will grow in bright sun or in shade. It can also be grown in the water trays which other CPs stand in. Winter min around 4C. To get it to flower, it needs to get very dense, and I think that giving a deep water in winter (6" or so), and in summer allowing the water to dry out until there is little more than sludgy peat and providing bright light helps to get it to flower.
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What's your terraria look like?
Rob-Rah replied to Jamesemt's topic in Terraria - Cultivation & Equipment
I have two terraria. Each has a thick layer of sphagnum moss on the bottom with lots of water, to sit nepenthes on (they don't sit in the water). Plants that want to stand in water like drosera and utrics get put in the water by moving the moss to one side. This is what I grow in them (or, in some cases, am immenently about to), which might interest you: No 1: 2' (long) x 12" (deep) x 18" (tall) Gets decent light, with a few hours of direct morning sun from a SE window next to it, supplemented with a small fluorescent tube in winter. No extra heating, although direct sun onto it raises the temps a lot (c. 60F-c.90F): Drosera adelae D.schizandra D. prolifera Nepenthes albomarginata N. adnata N. campanulata N. pervillei Utricularia calycifida No 2: 3' (long) 18" (deep) x 18" (tall) Shadier, away from a window, with some artificial lights, heated with a heat mat (c.75F-c.90F): N. ampullaria 'Cantley's Red' N. truncata (lowland) N. bellii U. calycifida I know that both of these tanks will ultimately be too small, but that's half the fun of it I guess...