FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

I think I killed my heli. My best guess after googling it is I overwattered it. A website says they hate over moist soil and when it rots the root it quickly turns from fine to awful. That's basically how it happened. Then when I went to trim dead traps the healthy ones easily fell off leading me to believe they were going that way anyway. Does anyone think I could save this? Maybe pull it and let the soil dry? I just got a ceph how moist do you water those?

Final question I got some cobra seeds I want to do this right so I can get at least 1 to grow. What's your best advice?

Humidity shock. Bag the pot with a ziplock to keep humidity high

Rot. The mix is much too peaty. I had the same issue when I used a peat mix. My new mix is approx. 1:1:1 APS (aquatic plant soil) : perlite : LFSM. Helis are not like highland neps, where if they sit in water their roots easily rot. Lowland neps can sit in a little water just fine, N. bicalcarata comes from actually swampy areas. I keep my helis sitting in approx. 3/4" of water, since they're in such an airy mix. If you do decide to use a more compact mix (higher in LFSM or peat) I'd recommend to lower the water level. Plus it looks like the humidity was a bit low and temps a bit too high. Bag when acclimating, especially if you're attempting to grow in lower humidity areas.

Cephs like to dry out between waterings. Keep cephs more wet when they're cold and drier when they're hot. If you keep them wet in the summer their leaves usually turn yellow. I keep my cephs in trays that I fill to the 1" or so mark and let dry for a few days between watering.

Darlingtonia need a cold stratification. I made my own seed this year and cold stratified them for six weeks (I believe?). Then, I planted them on a 2:1 perlite : peat mix and kept them in high humidity. In less than 10 days I had great germination, around 300 of 320 seeds germinated. Darlingtonia also like shadier conditions when maturing from seed, and frequent fertilization.

Great advice is already given. Just to add a bit -- Heliamphora enjoy a very, very loose soil mix. Yours definitely rotted, as was already mentioned. I like to use the highest quality long-fibered sphagnum I can find, along with lots of sand and perlite. It is somewhere around a 1:1:1 mix of those 3 ingredients in terms of volume.

Cephalotus are a little easier but also don't like being waterlogged. And using something to loosen the soil helps.

Both Heliamphora and Cephalotus seem to like very cool roots and respond well to having healthy microbes integrated with their root systems (Trichoderma and mycorrhiza). Both species can succumb to sudden death when an unhealthy bacteria takes hold of their soil and root system. This is more common in warmer temps but can happen even in cooler temps. That would appear to be what happened to your Heli. Sorry

Darlingtonia are similar as well. They are very tolerant of minerals, but not of warm root temperatures. Keep the roots cool, potted in loose soil, on all of these species, and prevent bad bacteria from blooming in the soil. You will have success!