FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hi,
I hear that if you want to grow a sundew you should start with a Drosera Aliciae because they are the easiest to grow and they can be grown year round. If that's true where would be a good place to purchase seeds?

Skip the seeds and go for an established plant. Seeds aren't the easiest way to get into CPs. A few CP retailers aliciae plants in stock of $5-$10. If you want to try from seeds I would go with capensis. It's a great plant and the seeds are extremely easy to find.

shenri wrote:Hi,
I hear that if you want to grow a sundew you should start with a Drosera Aliciae because they are the easiest to grow and they can be grown year round. If that's true where would be a good place to purchase seeds?

There is a FlyTrapCare Community Seedbank. You can get CP seed if you request it and send in an SASE. Drosera aliciae, Drosera capensis, and several other beginner species are in stock. Click on the link in my signature to check it out.

But to second what Smooter80 said, it is a good idea to start with a mature adult plant if you've never grown CP before. A mature plant is more tolerant of cultivation mistakes. Seedlings usually do not have the strength to survive if you make a mistake. Very few new growers get things perfect with their first attempts. You can find some articles and good growing information here. It's mostly about FlyTraps but also applies to Sundews, except for the dormancy requirements. Clean water, lots of light, and a CP friendly growing media are needed by (almost) all CP.

You can also post a request and see if any members of the community here have a D. aliciae or D. capensis that they'd be willing to part with.

Good growing,
Mike

Thanks for the info. I bought a small VFT and some seeds from FTS a week or so ago. The plant is doing great and caught 3 bugs sitting on my sill in about 5 days. I need to do something so it does not catch any more for a while. I also took a chance before I found this site and bought 10 VFT seed from 2 random Amazon sellers. One sellers seeds arrived crushed and I have yet to get a refund. Probably never will. The other sellers seeds were planted 1/20/17 and 4 germinated in 19 days. This is what they look like today. Now I'm ready to try some sundews.

Looks good! All you need now is lots of patience.

Good growing.
Mike

I've actually heard that D. aliciae is even tougher than D. capensis - it just doesn't get as much attention because it's a smaller and less showy plant.

nimbulan wrote:I've actually heard that D. aliciae is even tougher than D. capensis - it just doesn't get as much attention because it's a smaller and less showy plant.

I'd say it's equally tough as Drosera capensis except for two points. It seems to be very sensitive to Humic Acid buildup in its media. It is slower to recover from disturbance

On the plus side, it loves to colonize any container it's growing in. It has filled every fraction of every square inch of the 3.5 inch communal pot. It is threatening to burst the pot at its seams.

Good growing,
Mike

Here's a quick shot or two of my communal Drosera aliciae pot. It is a 3 1/2 inch round pot that I planted in Spring of 2015. Do you think it's ready for a new and larger pot?

Good growing,
Mike

Tarzanus wrote:I guess top watering may be a problem for you.

Actually I do top-water several times a year. Drosera aliciae tends to suffer from Humic Acid buildup. You'll see black material appearing on the growth point. Top - watering flushes this out. The plants re-dew pretty quickly. But most of the time, they sit in a water tray.

Good growing,
Mike