FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hello everyone,

I live in orange county and I started growing VFT's in september and considering how terrible I am with plants I'd say i'm doing fairly well, but not as well as I'd like. I started in september with 60 seeds of which about 20 germinated by october and then seeing as I could at least create the conditions they needed to germinate and grow I ordered the 25 baby vft pack from the flytrap store. I made the dumb decision to plant them in an unglazed flower pot, and out of the 32 I got (thanks!) I have 17 left. I keep them on the windowsill of a south facing window that usually gets a good amount of direct light a day. All the ones planted near the edge of the pot died or produced very small traps and then died, and the ones left nearer to the center have very wide petioles. The seedlings didn't respond too well to the lower amounts of light and about halfway through november and I lost half. I then got a 6400k light to save the rest and they have been doing ok and getting a nice coloration but I lost about three. I left the ones in the pot by the windowsill because my lamp that I'm using is not big enough for both them and the seedlings. I feel really bad about losing so many and I'd like to fix it so I don't lose any more. And now for my questions...

1) What should I do with the remaining vft's in the flower pot? I was thinking about repotting them in the spring but I really don't know if they'll last that long...

2) Why do they have wide petioles? Could it be that they're light starved? The traps have no coloration and most do not work/have damaged traps. What can I do or are they just dormant?

3) How many hours of light should I give the seedlings under the light? I've been giving them between 12 and 14 hours a day at about three inces away but I don't know if it is too much or not enough after I lost the three...

4) What do you guys think I should change?

All this being said I'm having a good time growing them and I'm surprised that ive kept them alive this long, all due to this website. Thank you very much.

Hey dude for just starting, it's not a huge deal when you lose young ones, and it looks to me as if you have been for the most part correctly dealing with any problems you've been experiencing, initially I have probably lost more flytraps than you and now they are thriving, keep at it work hard.

To help with the actual problem at hand, i would suggest not moving the fly traps if the pot is around 5 inches or deeper. It's good that you are supplementing their light, I'm curious as to whether you believe the plants are dormant or not? I'm not sure how strong your light is but 12-14 hours and 2-3 inches away is going to be plenty, unless the light is somewhat dull.

Make sure you are using water that is very pure, and not leaving the small traps in standing water.

Good luck, hope I could help

The larger ones that I ordered that are in the flower pot I have left by the window, and the seedlings I have supplimented the light. I'm not sure whether the ones in the pot dormant or not, they dont really fit the decriptions that I have read of dormant plants but i feel like they should be. I'm going to try moving them to a different spot and see if that helps.

Thank you for the advice and insight!