FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

I picked up this Nep from the Portland Nursery. The tag says that it is an alata, though I am not fully sure, the pitures seem a little deeper red. Does anyone have an idea of what it is? It seems a little light starved too, though it came from a nursery that doesn't specialize in carnivorous plants, so I expected it to be so. Also seems to be a little crowded in the pot, should I repot, in say a month, after it settles in?

Does it seem crowded? Should I think about repotting in the future? The medium seems to just be peat moss, which from what I have heard is not the most ideal medium for Nepenthes,.

Well the pot size seems ok to me but i would recommend putting it in a lighter mix before your roots fo rotting

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Chipi3s wrote:Yeah I would recommend a more airy mix for the roots, I use sphagnum moss with perlite 50/50 mix. If you can't obtain that for any reason you would still be fine just make sure your soil is moist at all times and not soaking wet.

As for separating the plants its up to you. Separating would probably stunt the plants growth for a while. If you want you could remove the plant and rinse the roots off real good then just put it in a bigger pot with the medium of your choice.

I suppose I will repot sometime soonish. Should I give it a few weeks to settle in to its new environment first?

Benurmanii wrote:Should I give it a few weeks to settle in to its new environment first?

Nah. These guys are tough, and you might as well get all of the acclimation and transplanting shock done in one sitting. Think of it like receiving a bare-root plant in the mail.

SerMuncherIV wrote:

Benurmanii wrote:Should I give it a few weeks to settle in to its new environment first?

Nah. These guys are tough, and you might as well get all of the acclimation and transplanting shock done in one sitting. Think of it like receiving a bare-root plant in the mail.

Alright, will do once I get some perlite and sphagnum moss.

Benurmanii wrote:Does it seem crowded? Should I think about repotting in the future? The medium seems to just be peat moss, which from what I have heard is not the most ideal medium for Nepenthes,.

yes repot as soon as you safely can. my last Neps I got from Home Depot were planted in that same pot with pure peat, and they both rotted out from Black Stem rot that started in the roots fairly quickly. it was a sad day when they both went :-/ so I repotted my 2 Ventratas I had that had been in coconut coir for 2 years (it started smelling moldy) into a peat/perlite mix and they seem happier!

So I repotted it the best I could, and I have not repotted any cp before. I removed most of the help of my mom, but she was worried that the root system was integrated too much in with the previous medium, so we just took out as much as we could (about half the pot) and filled the bottom half with some sphagnum/perlite/orchid bark mix, as well as adding a little bit of the mix to the top to help retain moisture around the leaves. Is this fine? I also accidentally got some dirt in one of the large pitchers, so I emptied it out and put some distilled water in to wash out the rest, then added a bit of distilled water to replace the bit lost (as I understand, the enzymes will start to come back, and the pitcher will keep the water level where it is needed).

Yes much better! Now the "ultimate" test to see how much better it drains is to water from the top and see if the excess water flows freely out the bottom. That's how I knew mine was airy enough looks good though...

Oh, and if you ever have trouble getting the old medium off, just soak the root ball in water for a few minutes, then swish it around. Good way to remove old stuff without breaking the fragile hair-like roots of neps

Earthy wrote:Oh, and if you ever have trouble getting the old medium off, just soak the root ball in water for a few minutes, then swish it around. Good way to remove old stuff without breaking the fragile hair-like roots of neps

Oh cool, thanks. I was thinking I could do something like that, but we didn't have much sphagnum moss (it was leftover from when I had many pet tarantulas) and my mom was nervous handling my plant and didn't want to damage it. Will keep that tip in mind in the future though!