FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

For the first month, DC XL was showing much faster growth compared to others and the roots even came out of the bottom of the pot. However, they have not been showing more impressive growth after that. Maybe it is because my pot is not tall enough.
Today, I want to show you pictures of my A2. They have surpassed the size of DC XL and B52 that came out of tissue culture on the same day. The largest traps are little bit over 2cm (=0.78 inches) already while DC XL and B52 are still about 1.5cm.
Below is the other pot that I planted only babies here. They have become large that they don't look babies any more.
Can you see that each new traps are noticeably larger than previous ones?

The A2's look great, Luxiloid. You are doing so well with these Flytraps from tissue culture, especially since they are so fragile immediately after they are taken from their sterile containers. you mentioned that Matt helped you a little regarding getting the plants comfortable and healthy after deflasking, but you also seem like a very fast learning regarding their care. Your Flytraps look beautiful and healthy.

Steve_D wrote:The A2's look great, Luxiloid. You are doing so well with these Flytraps from tissue culture, especially since they are so fragile immediately after they are taken from their sterile containers. you mentioned that Matt helped you a little regarding getting the plants comfortable and healthy after deflasking, but you also seem like a very fast learning regarding their care. Your Flytraps look beautiful and healthy.

Thanks, Steve.
I use bacteria method to make them healthy.
I use very fresh smelling cocopeat and apply some bacteria called trichoderma harzarium also with some other similar ones. Then, cover them with plastic bag and they grow like crazy under strong LED lights.

Wow, they're looking great luxiloid! Great job!

luxiloid wrote:I use very fresh smelling cocopeat and apply some bacteria called trichoderma harzarium T-22 also with some other similar ones. Then, cover them with plastic back and they grow like crazy under strong LED lights.

That's a good idea, using trichoderma to help them get settled in and rooted well.

Have you fed any of the traps insects yet? That seems to really give them a boost right out of TC too.

Matt wrote: Have you fed any of the traps insects yet? That seems to really give them a boost right out of TC too.

Oh really? I should try feeding them.

Luxiloid, there is one ingredient in your planting medium, the small light-brown pellets, that looks like LECA (lightweight expanded clay aggregate). Is that what it is, a type of aerated and fired porous clay? I have lots of that material and have thought about using it in a carnivorous plant mix.

luxiloid wrote:Oh really? I should try feeding them.

Yeah. When the traps get large enough that I can fit a small meal worm into them, I see a noticeable boost in growth after the first couple of feedings.

Steve_D wrote:Luxiloid, there is one ingredient in your planting medium, the small light-brown pellets, that looks like LECA (lightweight expanded clay aggregate). Is that what it is, a type of aerated and fired porous clay? I have lots of that material and have thought about using it in a carnivorous plant mix.

Hi Steve,
They are similar to your description called 'purilte'. The homepage is http://www.purilite.co.kr/ but too sad they don't have English menu.
Let me translate few feautres for you. It made of zeolite burnt in 2000 degeree Celcius to from small pores. 60% of the total volume is pores so that it can hold nutritions and moisture. It very hard that it does not break down. It has high capactity of trading ions. The pH is around 6~7.

I use this because they seem to be very safe to the flytraps. When I put them inside water, they sink rather than float and shows almost no TDS increase. Mixing these cocopeat or peat moss, the aeriation and drainage becomes better than normal sand while it can hold more moisture.

Thank you Luxiloid for the explanation. According to wikipedia, zeolite is an aluminosilicate, which is also what clays are. I'll bet that the purilite fired/expanded zeolite is very comparable to the LECA, lightweight expanded clay aggregate, which is produced by the same procedure (high firing in a kiln).

I've wondered about using LECA in a carnivorous mix for some time, but the only experiment I tried (pure LECA with no other ingredients) was disappointing. For one thing, the LECA I have was I'm guessing cooled and quenched in water after firing, and the water used was probably used over and over again and was very dirty and full of soluble material which soaked into the pores of the hot LECA pellets and which need to be removed from the LECA with repeated soakings before use in a planting medium. At any rate, the LECA I used yielded a lot of soluble material from its pores even though the LECA itself is completely inert and should be safe to use once the soluble material is removed.

Thanks for the experiments and the discussion!

Nice work, and Thank You for documenting it!

I've been wondering for some time now if the International store ships nationally....Matt? Steve?

Naja002 wrote:I've been wondering for some time now if the International store ships nationally....Matt? Steve?

There's a pretty strict separation between the domestic U.S. and internationally offered stock at FlytrapStore.com, mostly for business reasons.

Steve_D wrote:There's a pretty strict separation between the domestic U.S. and internationally offered stock at FlytrapStore.com, mostly for business reasons.

It make sense why, and it also make sense why you guys have a FTS source and a FTS

The FTS store's are design for every costumer nationally and internationally and actually benefits both the customer and the seller, If Matt and Steve started selling TC plants in USA, then people would stop buying the hardened plants and TC plants are way cheaper compare to hardened plants.

jht-union wrote: If Matt and Steve started selling TC plants in USA, then people would stop buying the hardened plants and TC plants are way cheaper compare to hardened plants.

Well, not likely that droves of Americans will line up to buy TC containers of unhardened plants, jht. The CP world has always been full of noobs the vast majority of which come and go in short order. Many are intimidated/uncertain about doing some of the most basic stuff, so it's not likely that they would be interested in jumping into TC acclimation.

Steve_D wrote:

Naja002 wrote:I've been wondering for some time now if the International store ships nationally....Matt? Steve?

There's a pretty strict separation between the domestic U.S. and internationally offered stock at FlytrapStore.com, mostly for business reasons.

Not to derail this thread too far, but any thoughts to adding the TC containers to the Source? Personally, I'm not interested in buying atm, but I may very well be interested in the future.

Naja002 wrote:Not to derail this thread too far, but any thoughts to adding the TC containers to the Source?

Matt might wish to add his own comments to this discussion when he reads it, because Matt's the FlytrapStore TC guy (I don't know much about it), but it is unlikely (in line with our current thinking, anyway) that tissue-cultured containers of plants will be added to any part of FlytrapStore.com that sells to the U.S. market. However, some sales of tissue-cultured plants to customers in the United States by private arrangement is not out of the question, depending on the specific circumstances. How's that for intentionally only half-answering the question?

Steve_D wrote:Matt might wish to add his own comments to this discussion when he reads it, because Matt's the FlytrapStore TC guy (I don't know much about it), but it is unlikely (in line with our current thinking, anyway) that tissue-cultured containers of plants will be added to any part of FlytrapStore.com that sells to the U.S. market. However, some sales of tissue-cultured plants to customers in the United States by private arrangement is not out of the question, depending on the specific circumstances. How's that for intentionally only half-answering the question?

Hah, well done Steve

I've considered long and hard the benefits/drawbacks of selling TC containers within the United States. I think it would only appeal to a very small subset of the CP community and therefore not be worth our time to offer them. As Naja pointed out:

Naja002 wrote:Well, not likely that droves of Americans will line up to buy TC containers of unhardened plants, jht. The CP world has always been full of noobs the vast majority of which come and go in short order. Many are intimidated/uncertain about doing some of the most basic stuff, so it's not likely that they would be interested in jumping into TC acclimation.

That means that the only likely customers would be other people trying to acquire flytraps in TC to propagate them en mass and sell them. Propagating established cultures is extremely easy, but getting a culture established is challenging, time consuming and requires quite a bit of skill. If we were to sell cultures domestically, we'd be selling our competition our hard work. For that reason, I don't think that we'll ever sell cultures domestically. But it may happen someday with some select few clones that are already well propagated and in the hands of many other TCers.

But we do, from time to time, work out equitable trades for cultures by private arrangement (as Steve already mentioned).