Jump to content

How much light and humidity should I have when propagating neps?


Yossu

Recommended Posts

I have a Nepenthes Ventrata, whose two original branches had reached about seven feet long each. As some of the lower leaves were dying off (see this thread for a pic and the advice I got about it), I decided to have a go at snipping them down and propagating new plants from them.

I followed a video that Welshy (think he changed his name to North West Neps or something similar recently) showed me ages ago, and now have about 25 cuttings sitting in a propagator under a full spectrum light. See below...

170709NepenthesVentrataCuttingsInPropagator.jpg

The cuttings are in plastic cups of deionised water, with about 4-5 cuttings per cup, and the propagator was been partly filled with more water to make it really humid in there.

I'm wondering what levels of light and humidity I should aim for. The video said to keep up the humidity, but my plant was sitting on a windowsill, so not subject to much higher humidity than a normal houseplant would get. I did get a bit more, as it was sitting over a tray of waterlogged clay pebbles, but the levels in the propagator are significantly higher than that. I haven't put a meter in there to measure it, but there are quite a lot of water droplets condensed on the clear lid, so it's obviously quite humid in there.

The light was bought from eBay, but thanks to their hopelessly vague email, I'm not sure exactly which it was. I think it's a 36W cool white LED bulb.

Anyone able to comment if I'm doing this right or wrong? This is my first go at this, and I'd like to get it right.

Thanks

Edited by Yossu
Link to comment
Share on other sites

You can not fail with a ventrata. I cut several basal shoots a couple of months ago, bagged them and placed them everywhere in the GH (some in very dark places). Every single one rotted.

Cuttings want high humidity (up to 100%) in order to develop the roots, so it does not matter if the mother plant is in a 20% RH all day long.

 

As a rule, with other more demanding neps, I give the cuttings exactly the same amount of light as the mother plant receives.   

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Did you mean "Every single one rooted"?

Thanks for the reply. I'll leave them there then. I don't reckon I can get higher humidity than they are getting.

Will I need to acclimatise them when removing them from the propagator? When they root, I'll want to plant them, and they will have to come out of there. Will they need to adapt to lower humidity?

Thanks again.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OK, thanks to both of you. Mine are actually fairly warm, as they are in my office, which stays a fairly constant warm temperature.

Any idea how long I'll need to wait? The video said a couple of months, but I don't know how the different environment would affect them. I'm just impatient!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It shouldnt matter if you leave them in although i like to get rid of dead ones just to keep things tidy.  I wouldnt worry too much about it either unless a few other ones start to brown off, neps can be funny and die off for no obvious reason.  The rest should root well enough.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...