FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hello everyone, I'm new to these forums. I bought a few baby VFTs last month, and they have been doing alright, until recently: in the last few days I have noticed the edges of some leaves and traps turning yellow, brown, and black. I know the leaves turn black as they get old and die, but the number of leaves turning black in my pot has me worried that I am doing something wrong.

Some background info:
-The growing medium is a mix of perlite and sphagnum peat, with more perlite towards the bottom of the pot, with a bit of long fiber sphagnum on top of the peat and around the rhizomes. I thoroughly rinsed it all with distilled water when I purchased it.
-I have only been watering with store bought ozonated distilled water.
-I have been giving the plants as much sunlight as possible, as well as a couple of hours of extra light under an LED grow light each evening.
-The pot is made of plastic, opaque, and white.
-I have fed the traps a few small bugs, mostly flies, ants, and small caterpillars.

The new growth traps that are coming in look healthy, and the rhizomes themselves look a healthy white. But I am still concerned. Any advice would be appreciated! Thank you

Panman wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 10:35 pm In my opinion, it looks like chemical burn. What brand of peat and perlite are you using? There may be fertilizer in them.

The Perlite is Promix:
https://www.promixgardening.com/en/prod ... ix-perlite

The peat is Golfreen 100% Canadian Sphagnum Peat Moss I also sprinkled some garden sulphur on them to prevent crown rot as I read that sulphur is safe for VFTs.

Hello!

I have the exact same problem, mine looks identical. I use only rainwater and it is potted in a 50/50 perlite/peat mix.

Please respond if you find out what causedor if you managed to stop it wilting.

@Panman I think you were right about it being chemical/salt burn, and I think it was probably the perlite I used. I put the pot in my bathtub, and misted it with rainwater I had collected - two full Nalgene bottles which is about 64oz of rainwater, allowing it to drain out the bottom and down the drain. Since doing that the plants have stopped turning black and are looking a bit better.
I didn't have a TDS meter at the time I potted the plants, which I probably should have. I ordered one and should receive it soon, and I will use it to test my perlite, peat, and sulphur to find out what is the culprit.

Ok, my TDS meter arrived and I did some tests by mixing my materials with distilled water. The water alone has 0-1 ppm.
Peat + water = 18 ppm.
Perlite + water = 6 ppm.
Sulphur + water = 170 ppm.
So, it must be the sulphur. Although from reading this post I had thought sulphur was safe for CPs. So I wasn't expecting this. Perhaps I will need to switch to neem oil instead.

Panman wrote:It could have been too much sulfur. You just want a very light dusting.

Am I supposed to dust it on the leaves of the plants, or onto the growing media? I must have gotten too much of it around the rhizomes

Update: I had to cut off many leaves that were dying so the plants could focus on new growth. One of the plants is thriving, the others are struggling - especially the small divisions I had which took the most damage. Most of the leaves are green and healthy now but a few of them are still showing damage on the petioles.
Had to rinse the growing media quite a few times. At one point the water coming out the bottom had TDS over 500. Moral of the story is, be careful with sulfur...or use hydrogen peroxide instead.