FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

so i have noticed something, i left a couple cultures away from the light for... a few weeks to a month, and they have put out an incredible amount of growth, they do look a little spindly/light starved, but honestly it doesnt look as bad as you'd expect


i also have a culture that i dropped down the side of the desk, and lost track of for maybe a month, and when i found it, it had so much more growth and developed into like 10 distinct growing points out of only 2 or 3
what do you guys think?

It's a common technique in tissue culture to use little to no light for certain species and depending on what you're trying to achieve with the growth.

I normally leave my initializations in pretty dark conditions for the first few weeks to a couple of months.

I think because they have sucrose/sugar in the medium, they don't actually need to photosynthesize. Photosynthesis normally takes CO2+water+blue/red light and makes sugar. Since they can absorb the sugar osmotically in TC they can grow in the dark.

Another possibility I suppose is dark induced indogenous hormone disorder and CH2=CH2 accumulation.

entropy81 wrote:I think because they have sucrose/sugar in the medium, they don't actually need to photosynthesize. Photosynthesis normally takes CO2+water+blue/red light and makes sugar. Since they can absorb the sugar osmotically in TC they can grow in the dark.

well that's a given, but you'd think in light they would have that ontop of whatever they manage to photosynthesize

Minus light, the plant's endogenously produced IAA breaks down more slowly allowing the plant to use the hormone to expand its cells (i.e. stretch its leaves). Some culture techniques with orchids and embryos use dark incubation. VFTs may not need the light for food production in TC, but is necessary for photo cues such as chlorophyll production, etc. In regards to stressing cultures in general, ABA production during stressed periods may lead to some interesting things happening. However, with VFTs, these guys are profuse branchers anyway.