FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

I bought my first cephalotus plant and it arrived almost two weeks ago (see picture 1). I potted the plant, small peat + perlite plug and all, in a larger pot with approximately 50:50 LFSM and pool filter sand with pool filter sand as a top dressing (see picture 2). I tried to keep it in a ziploc bag to "harden it off" to my growing environment (sunny window sill), but then gave up after 1 day because I was worried about mold and mildew. I water it once every 3-4 days, twice a week, from the bottom. I place it in a shallow tray (0.5-1cm) of distilled water for 20min to an hour and then I dump any excess water left on the tray.

Almost all the juvenile pitchers dried out over the course of 2 days approximately 1 week in (see picture 3a and 3b). They were such a dark purple that it was hard to tell until they shrivelled up. There are two pitchers left (see picture 4a), and while I was watering it today, I saw a white powdery substance just under the lip of the largest pitcher (See picture 4b). Is this mildew?

Is this normal transport shock or should I have acclimated it better? Should I trim away all the dead pitchers? Repot the whole plant? Bust out the fungicide? Any and all advice is greatly appreciated.

In a plastic bag for a day? In a sunny window sill? You probably cooked it. You are really lucky anything is left.

Thank you for the response.

Sorry, I wasn't clear. I didn't move it into the sun until a few days (3-4) after I got it and I gave up on the plastic bag after one day. It wasn't ever in the plastic bag and in the sun at the same time. It was in a shaded area of a sunny, south facing room, I only took it briefly into sunlight to take pictures. The ambient temperature shouldn't have been over 25C.

But it's a good observation that the juvenile pitchers dried up shortly after I moved it into full sun. Maybe the sun dried it out, plastic bag or no.

Ah, I see, then you probably just have classic transport shock coupled with the usual acclimation problems that come with a change in growing conditions. As for advice, what I would probably do is trim away the dead pitchers, don't repot as more stress is bad, use a fungicide if things get worse, keep it cool, and try to promote good airflow. Normally, I would also suggest increasing the humidity but if you are having mold issues that would obviously be a bad idea.

Sounds good, thank you for the advice! I will trim off what I can tonight.

Speaking of not cooking your plants, I boiled most of the sphagnum moss I've been growing today by forgetting the whole container out in the blazing afternoon sun. Tips that were bright green this morning have gone bleach white. I've been playing stupid games shifting it around trying to get the most sun and humidity without stepping over the temperature threshhold and today I guess I win the stupid prize. Lesson learned.

It will likely come back from the roots. It’s not uncommon for it to lose all the pitchers after shipping/potting.
Just keep doing what your doing and watch for new growth.