Rob-Rah

Basic question, but I'm new to terraria... Can anyone suggest a decent way of ensuring a night minimum of 60-65F for lowland neps and other tropical things? I have a terarium in my house that the lights will heat during the day, but once they turn off it might need some more heat in the night - the house temperature might fall to 55F some nights. At the moment there is a base of hortag (expanded clay pellets) topped with some live shagnum, on which the pots sit. Do heat mats for things like scorpions and spiders cope with the possibility of being submerged sometimes? Any ideas? Thanks.

Is it warmth or light the plant needs as a priority? Incidentally, I found that the plant needs quite pure water and very low amounts of dissolved salts to be happy. It's far happier now I repotted it into pure sphagnum moss than it was in a peat/sand mixture. Even standing it in the same water tray as pots with vermiculite in their mix seemed to upset it as well. Does anyone else have problems with this species? Cheers.

Agreed completely. I tend not to order anything in winter in any case. I was just wondering what your experience of the plant was, perhaps with a view to getting hold of one next year. The light requirement seems to me to be the most daunting aspect from what I have read.

Does anyone grow this plant? What kind of culture does it require? Cheers for anyone in the know.

It's so nice to see pic of the whole plant, pot and all! All these beautiful closeups posted recently make me forget the joy I get from seeing the big picture when I walk into my greenhouse.

They'll do OK with bright light from your tubes and no direct sun at all, though the colours may not be as bright and the nectar spoon may be smaller. They don't need terribly high humidity either: only around 50% humidity. They're tropical mountain plants, not jungle plants. Mine are in an unheated greenhouse in summer and are heated to a miniumum of 10C in winter. Aside from this, I let the British weather do what it wants to the temperatures. Try overhead watering a couple of times a day to keep the plants cool maybe?

Heliamphora take a long time to produce adult pitchers if they're too hot. They may revert to juvenile form like yours if they encounter excessive heat on the cusp between juvenile and adult. Ideally, you want to try and get the temp to fall to 15-20C every now and then (or every night if you can). As far as I know, once they've been "adult" for a fair while, it is much much less likely that the problem will recur, although Helis all come from montane places with a good nighttime drop in temperatures, and will suffer if subjected to continual hot nights.

Can someone suggest a live food I can give to my U. gibba. It's in a half-size glass demijohn in about 4 inches of rainwater with a little peat at the bottom. (I also grow some in the water trays in the greenhouse, but I really want to try it like this indoors as well). I can see that the bladders are very tiny, too tiny maybe for things like daphnia and mosquito larvae. It's not just a food issue: I would like to introduce a little more organic life into the jar in order to allay any chance of the water stagnating. Any ideas for what wee beasties I could get - is a cup of pond water going to help or might I just introduce undesireable extras?

It's nice - but you may need extra bandwidth making available !

Yes, it did come from Chris (aren't some of his own complex hybrids stunning? - I hope they appear for sale at some point). I had a very long look at his plants, l but I didn't see any more upright ones, either with the general sales stock or elsewhere - though I didn't think to ask specifically at the time! I will wait and see what mine's like in a few years - like yours, it's a small plant still.

Darwin's puvlications on the web include an essay on U. alpina (which he called U. montana - it's the same plant). He exmined the tubers and found that a plant can go for around 30 days without water before the leaves are affected. He examined the surprising water-holding capacity of the tubers and concluded that these allow the plant to survive drought. I too neever dry my plants out, but it seems that it would not be a problem if you did.....

But we're at atage where even the named hybirds seem to diverge - what are the parameters of "normal" umlauftiana?

I would imagine more frills and white/red venation in umlauftiana than shown in those pics.... I'll post a pic of mine when I get a chance to.

OK - I'll wait until Christmas and see what happens by then. Thanks again.

They're in a large heated tank (4' x 3' x 2.5') within a greenhouse. It's not particuarly airtight, and is not stuffy, but the humidity is very high. I was pessimistic about all four plants a few weeks ago, but was pleasantly surprised when I looked at them a couple of days ago to see that two of them now seem to be OK. Maybe it's just a matter of more patience for the other two?

I have been told that the onset of adult pitchers is delayed by keeping the plants too hot and/or stuffy. If your plants are on the cusp, maybe keeping them a little cooler might help, and fresh air is appreciated, as long as humidity remains high. I had a plant 'revert' after I bought it a few years ago, and I put it down to it having to get used to sunnier (and therefore hotter) conditions than that at from whence it came - it had been grown in a cold frame outside in the shade for the summers, and I was bringing it into a greenhouse.

About a month ago I receieved my first 4 Genliseas, just a leaf or two each and a couple of little roots. All but one died back, and now two have started to make new leaves above the substrate. There's still no sign from the other two. How long do you think I should be patient for? Can they take a while to get established and re-shoot from the roots, or do you think that if they haven't done anything after this long that they're probably goners? Fwiw, they're potted in uncompacted peat/sand with the water level ardound the surface of the soil, and temps are 10-30C in semi shade.

Earlier this year I accquired a young plant of this hybrid [(S. purpurea x S. psitticina) x (S. leucophylla x S. psitticina)]. It seems to be mostly decumbent. I have waited until the autumn to see if any of the uprighness of leucophylla shows through as it has done splendidly with some of my other hybirds, but it still looks not very different from psitticina - though nice and colourful all the same. Does anyone else grow this hybrid? The pics online I have seen look very different to mine. Is it likely to a maturity issue, or is this a plant that varies a great deal according to the constitution of the grandparents used?

Can someone indicate to me what kind of price is usual for a smallish N. ampullaria 'Cantley's Red' plant? I've seen it on a couple of lists and it looks astonishly expensive. Not sure I want to buy yet, hence I'm posting here, and not in Sales/Wants. Any advice appreciated.

I like plastic mesh baskets too - seems to keep the sphagnum moss better aerated, which asissts with prevention of decomposition. I had my alpina in vermiculite/orchid bark earlier this year, but it didn't like it as much as the sphag/perlite mix (though longifolia loved it!). I don't know whether it was the vermiculite it objected to, but I eventually repotted it and removed all the old compost for good measure. I don't generally like pure sphagnum as it compacts easily and can go sour, but use it for humboldtii, nelumbifolia, being careful not to firm it down any more than is needed to anchor the plant gently (and also for Drosera villosa, which appeciates the sterile conditions it helps create). There's also economics: sphagnum moss is usually more expensive and harder to source than perlite, so I prefer to bulk up with the cheaper ingredients where possible! Cheers.

Phew! Lucky call. (Coincidentally, I just potted up an alpina division in half moss and half perlite last night: to avoid stagnated roots, water from overhead every now and then)

I'm not sure that alpina wants as much water as you're giving it. It has little tubers underground to enable it to cope with drier periods. I keep winter mins of 50F/10C for both species, as neither requires a cool dormancy. I remove both from the water tray and keep moist in winter, but just as a precuation against rot - growth slows down with shorter days and lower temps. Then again, I've not flowered humboldtii yet.

Looks like it's experiencing a Renaissance under your care.

I was trying to get a N. ampullaria on ebay today - however that one went for a quite ridiculous price over £30 after P&P - and only a small plant (South West Carnivores are doing it for £15). Shame I won't have it as a little friend in a terrarium with me at Uni now though Anyone feel the need to share me a little bit of one if available?

Good news if that's so Tim. (I read it on two websites - one of which was in French.)