FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

@Matt: I looked at all of your videos posted on YouTube. It's great to see how the commercial growers take care of their plants. I have a question about your flytrap mother pots (the big ones). Do these pots have drainage? I didn't see any saucers or trays underneath them. If you aren't using drainage, then how to you regulate the water level?

MikeB wrote:Do these pots have drainage?

@MikeB, Yes, each of those pots has a single drainage hole in the bottom of it.

MikeB wrote:If you aren't using drainage, then how to you regulate the water level?

I simply water them from the top until water flows out the bottom of the pots. Then I wait several days to water again. In the summer, it's usually 4 or 5 days between waterings. In the winter, they can sometimes go over 2 weeks before needing water. I just stick my finger down into the moss a bit to ensure that it is still damp beneath the surface. Once it starts getting more than an inch before I feel moisture and the pots feel light when I pick them up, then it's time to water.

In the very bottom of the pots, there is about 4 or 5 inches of peat/sand/perlite mix which helps hold the water longer and better than just pure long-fiber sphagnum would.

Okay, the lack of saucers had me confused. Do you have any issues with the wooden benches rotting from the moisture? Around here, it's so humid during the summer that wet bench tops wouldn't last very long.

MikeB wrote:Okay, the lack of saucers had me confused. Do you have any issues with the wooden benches rotting from the moisture? Around here, it's so humid during the summer that wet bench tops wouldn't last very long.

No, no problems with rot here. It's super dry here most of the year. The winters are cool and damp, but most of the year the humidity level is in the 20%-40% range so the wood dries out quickly. Also, I just redid all of the benchtops this year for the first time since I built the greenhouses and benches. I think the big greenhouse where we did the video was completed in 2010...maybe 2011? And it had particle board for the tops with no drainage at all, so it did sag a bit in the middle. But this summer I removed our redwood deck and repurposed all of the lumber to use it as greenhouse bench tops!! We have swanky redwood greenhouse bench tops now

I should probably sand it down and stain/seal it at some point, but the truth is that it would likely last 50 years here in the greenhouse without doing anything to it. Thus, I'll probably never do it as there is plenty of other stuff around here to do that is a higher priority to keep me busy.