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Hi everybody,

I want to share some experiments with peat-free substrates regarding the Sarracenia cultivation. These are some examples with coir+perlite mix and pure sawdust, ispired by the interesting article of Tim Bailey that I've read on AIPC's magazine:

coir+ perlite:

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Edited by pandalf
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Your plants are very well grown Pandalf.

Have they been grown from seed in the compost you use?

Here is a topic i posted some results in earlier this year

http://www.cpukforum.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=49981&st=20

I find adult plants will grow well in peat free composts,but seedlings are totally different.

ada

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They look fantastic! Do you use certified salt-free coir?

Hi Stephen,

unfortunatly the coir that I've used this year (Ugro) doesn't report any information about the salinity.

In two years I've tested three brands (Ugro, Canna, Bionova).. only with the first two I've had good results.

Your plants are very well grown Pandalf.

Have they been grown from seed in the compost you use?

Here is a topic i posted some results in earlier this year

http://www.cpukforum...49981&st=20

I find adult plants will grow well in peat free composts,but seedlings are totally different.

ada

interesting topic Ada. I've sowed some seeds in spring 2012, but due to parasites and the momentary lack of coir I reported the seedlings in peat. These are some photos of the pots in coir:

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Next year I will try to repeat the experiment.

Edited by pandalf
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thanks wozzen, it could be interesting a discussion about the salt percentages.

These are some photos of a Sarracenia hybrid in pure sawdust:

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and other plants that we've prepared for AIPC conservation project at last italian meeting.

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Edited by pandalf
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Pandalf, the seedlings in peat are looking good, i left some in moorland gold and repotted some in fresh moorland gold as a control for the ones i repotted in peat.

The peat gives great results very quickly,but other factors come into the equation,such as length of growing period and temperature/light.

I'm sure you will understand this being more southern in location than northern England.

ada

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Yes it's surely a factor. I kept the seedlings in a place with lower light last year, but I want to retry the experiment with more sun.

Edited by pandalf
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I planted some straggly VFT's in rotted down Larch needle compost/ Perlite and Grit sand at the start of August and they have grown fairly well, certainly have not shown an signs of distress.

I got the larch compost by visiting a small plantation near where I live and scraped the dropped needles from the surface of the ground. Underneath the needles was a material a bit like peat. I included some needles in my compost mixture.

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I tried growing some CP in sawdust in the past and it degraded quite fast.

Do you remember the type of wood?

This is the condition of the substrate after a year:

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The substrate in the last picture seem to be still good, and the plant is looking very fine. About coir, have you washed it again? Because in the description of the product that you have linked, they say that is washed in freshwater.

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It looks like you have used wood shavings, whereas I used wood sawdust which is much finer. I got pellets intended for cat litter trays and poured on boiling water, which breaks them back into sawdust. But as I said, they rotted very quickly.

Presumably you do not stand the pots containing wood shavings in water all the time?

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The substrate in the last picture seem to be still good, and the plant is looking very fine. About coir, have you washed it again?

I haven't whased it. Anyway I want to do more tests with the measurement of conductivity.

Presumably you do not stand the pots containing wood shavings in water all the time?

I've taken a high level of water for this pot for all the time for prevent the dehydration of the substrate with no treatment.

Probably the wood is different.

Edited by pandalf
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E-Coco Products (www.ecoco-ecoco.com via ebay), who sell the pre-packaged coir products.

They are going to send me their analysis (they use freshwater coir, not the salty stuff which has to be leached first) and a load of materials to use in the trials and are keen to work with us.

They've told me they get quite a lot of return business so that's positive and I understand that the Electrical Conductivity (measure of dissolved salts) they state on their packaging (<0.5 mS/cm) is a high safety margin and should be much lower than that in reality. Ideally we should be looking for a target of 0.1 mS/cm, which is roughly what you would get if you soaked and drained Fertile Fibre coir prior to use. I'm guessing from my chat that their coir is likely to be similar.

They also supply rice husk as an alternative to perlite, though the jury is out on that as some rice husk can eventually break down and release some nutrients. I'll trial some of this too + charcoal coconut shell.

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E-Coco Products (www.ecoco-ecoco.com via ebay), who sell the pre-packaged coir products.

I was thinking of getting some of this myself, particularly as the supplier of an alternative coir product I have used in the past does not respond to email enquiries. I would be interested on knowing how you get on with this product.

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Here's one of my peat-free experiments: Water Rooted Cephalotus in Hydroculture.

Very interesting! Keep up the good work :thumbsup:

these are the roots of Sarracenia after a year in beech wood shavings

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wood shavings after a year in water.

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new plants repotted for the test:

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Edited by pandalf
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Very interesting to see that the shavings have not started to rot. This is much different from my experience with sawdust, so I suspect that the more open texture of the shavings is the key here, as they would allow for much better airflow.

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