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Drosera capensis division - or not?


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Hi everyone,

Brand new to the forum and only a couple of months into owning my CPs. I am not a botanist and also not a native English speaker, but I hope I manage to explain things properly. So far, I have VFTs, Drosera paradoxa, D. capensis, and a ping that I assume is a Tina based on online pics and the fact that it came from a plant retailer.

I live in Denmark, and I'm growing my plants in my window sill. I know that there are fancier and more optimal setups, but this is what I can manage at this point. I do collect rain water and bugs for my plants, and they seem to be doing well so far :)

My question is: should I didvide my capensis? I see pics of capensis with a structure more similar to paradoxa i.e. a central point from which all the leaves originate. I am pretty sure I must have multiple plants in each pot, but is there a right and wrong time to divide, and is it even necessary before next spring? I've had them since Aug 4th, so less than a month.

I have ordered spaghnum moss, and I have some soil specifically for "sowing and growing seedlings" (translated from Danish), which is spaghnum mixed with some type of sand. 

I tried repotting one of my paradoxas into the latter medium, because a lot of its original medium had spilled during transportation, and the plant became like a miniature. The leaves are much shorter, but it has more dew than the untouched ones. Was thinking to mix some moss in with the soil for my next attempt. All have flower stalks and I'm practicing emasculation and cross pollination on the first 2 which are from the same store, while I wait for the hopefully unrelated one to flower. Also tried some leaf pullings, but didn't seem to get much stipule(?) on my pulled clusters... they are in a sealed jar with rainwater.

Sorry for this very long first post - just so excited to be part of the CPUK community and looking forward to your input :)

20220829_131751.jpg

Edited by JLee
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Thank you for your reply :)  

I was mostly looking for advice on whether or not it hurts the plants to grow like this and if there is a certain time of year/growth cycle that is better for division?

For plants that enter dormancy, I would divide and/or repot as they come out of dormancy, but for D. capensis it may not matter when I do it?

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Thank you all for taking the time to reply to my post :) 

It seems I'm asking the question wrong as all the replies say that it doesn't hurt the plant to divide or that I will have plenty of plants either way and not to worry if some perish along the way. What I really wanted to learn, though, was if it hurts the plants to grow this close i.e. if I don't divide will they eventually die from over crowding? The goal here is not to have new plants but to keep the existing ones happy :)

Anyways, since none of you have stated this specifically, I'll gather that they should be fine in a cluster like this, which I find very pleasing to the eye :)

I do have a propagation project going, but that's just because it's interesting to read about the techniques and try to get it to work as a newbie.

I did some pruning of yellowing leaves in one of the pots yesterday and placed some of the better looking ones in water to try propagation this way. And then, I noticed some strikes from the accidental leaf cuttings I made on pick-up day, and I think its safe to say that I'm gonna be getting a lot of capensis seeds in the near future!

My paradoxas seem way harder to propagate by the methods I'm testing (cross-pollination between unrelated plants, leaf pullings), but I'll keep trying! Maybe some root cuttings next...

It's just a fun project to spend time on and very nice to have the easy-to-deal with capensis for rewards along the way.

Thank you again for sharing your insights! I'm so happy that I got into carnivorous plants :D

PS.: The box in the corner of the pic contains ping leaves, and just today, I'm seeing tiny strikes. Even though I know this method should be very easily successful, it's still exciting to experience it firsthand!

20220911_065824.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

You can get bigger more visually appealing plants if you grow single but they only look really nice for a season or two. If you grow as a clump they are individually smaller but fill any pot with an impressive mass of sticky leaves. I do both :D I've some big pots, 5+ years old, that die back in winter but regrow as a solid mass plants each year (but if I don't get the flowers produce literally thousands of seeds....). Hope that gives you the answer you were looking for :rolleyes:

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3 hours ago, Dunc said:

You can get bigger more visually appealing plants if you grow single but they only look really nice for a season or two. If you grow as a clump they are individually smaller but fill any pot with an impressive mass of sticky leaves. I do both :D I've some big pots, 5+ years old, that die back in winter but regrow as a solid mass plants each year (but if I don't get the flowers produce literally thousands of seeds....). Hope that gives you the answer you were looking for :rolleyes:

This is very helpful indeed! Thank you so much for posting :)

The accidental leaf cuttings look almost ready to be transfered from their water crib to soil, and I was planning to place those in a bigger pot with some space between them. I am also planning to gather seeds (allowing some of the flowers to self-pollinate), so I should be sure to have plants to enjoy both currently and in seasons to come :)

It is good to know that even if the mother plants die back, they could still be reincarnated ;) do you recommend to keep watering them in the saucer during the "dormancy", or should I top water/spray until new growth begins? I would not water as much as in the summer, of course :)

 

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20 hours ago, JLee said:

This is very helpful indeed! Thank you so much for posting :)

The accidental leaf cuttings look almost ready to be transfered from their water crib to soil, and I was planning to place those in a bigger pot with some space between them. I am also planning to gather seeds (allowing some of the flowers to self-pollinate), so I should be sure to have plants to enjoy both currently and in seasons to come :)

It is good to know that even if the mother plants die back, they could still be reincarnated ;) do you recommend to keep watering them in the saucer during the "dormancy", or should I top water/spray until new growth begins? I would not water as much as in the summer, of course :)

 

Just keep them damp over winter, not sitting in water. Also water by the tray method as usual. If you keep them outside in a greenhouse they'll die back and come back to life in the spring.

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Here it may be necessary to point out that despite the UK in CPUK not everyone is in Brittain.

Where I am in western Sweden close to Gothenburg they do not come back in spring after even a mild winter in the greenhouse. OP is in Denmark. Depending on where in Denmark they may or may not come back in spring after a mild winter. If it is a harsh winter, I would be supriced if it would be possible to overwintering capensis in unheated greenhouse anywhere in Denmark.

BR

Magnus

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