FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

As anyone living in the northern half of the US knows, we get a ton of leaves around this time of year. I just raked our lawn and came up with a ton of leaves. I've heard that leaves are good mulch on normal garden plants. Would they be okay for carnivorous plants? I realize that they would eventually decompose and add nutrients to the soil, but they would just be on in the winter. My bog garden I'm thinking about mulching with leaves has some Sarracenia, a venus flytrap, and a few Drosera rotundifolia.

Thanks!

Don't do it.

Leafs are a natural fertilizer.

Do you need it?

Where I live it can get pretty cold, around 0 degrees fahrenheit. If not tree leaves, what else could I use?

I’ve seen people talk about mulching beds for winter. I don’t remember leaves, but their nutrient content is actually really low. I do remember people talking about using pine needles. The bonus is the needles add acidity.

Pine needles just take a very long time to break down where as leafs just a month or two.

Why do you have to leave them outside for winter?

I don't have to---I just don't have a good place to put them otherwise. Last winter I dug out all the plants and overwintered them in the refrigerator, but I kept getting paranoid about mold, and some mold actually started growing on some of the plants. There weren't any casualties, though. My garage doesn't have any space to hold plants, and inside it gets too warm. Overwintering them where they are seems like the best option.

im right there with you man, I dug a spot IN the ground and put my massive planters in them. God I hope they make it this time, last year I lost everything. E V E R Y T H I N G

They probably won't unfortunately. I'm also in Michigan and to get low enough into the ground you would need to be at least 3 feet down. You will also have the problem of zero moisture and any moisture you add will vanish quickly.

Do you guys have a basement or garage?

Fieldofscreams wrote:They probably won't unfortunately. I'm also in Michigan and to get low enough into the ground you would need to be at least 3 feet down. You will also have the problem of zero moisture and any moisture you add will vanish quickly.

Do you guys have a basement or garage?

Unfortunately the basement works about as well as my garage---it doesn't get below 50 in there, ever.

I do have a garden shed though--could something like that work? I've heard people talking about stuff like that, but I don't really see how it keeps any heat in/cold out.

Temp isn't what is important, it's the natural decrees in light.

Leave your plants outside until first frost. Then move them to your basement or garage and put them under grow lights that you have timed to the natural sunrise and sunset for your area.

You can make the leaf idea work but you have to put down a section of burlap over the bog first and then the leaves on top of the burlap and then something on top of the leaves to keep them from blowing away. Then in the spring, you can just use the ground covering of burlap to remove the leaf remains. What are the downsides of this? First of all, if its wet under the leaves (like in a bog) you can get mold problems and secondly, little furry animals will sometimes take advantage of your thoughtfulness. I have read, that if you have a decent amount of consistent snow cover in your area, you probably don't need to mulch as the snow will take care of it for you so that's something to consider as well.

My plants went dormant on a sunny windowsill in a heated bedroom just fine last year. Light is much more a trigger for dormancy than temperature.

Bhart90 wrote:im right there with you man, I dug a spot IN the ground and put my massive planters in them. God I hope they make it this time, last year I lost everything. E V E R Y T H I N G

When I lost 30 plants I imagine you felt the same way as i. Dang sorry to hear

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