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Ask questions about how to grow and care for Venus Flytraps

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By Jagasian
Posts:  200
Joined:  Mon Jan 22, 2018 1:16 am
#353178
I started this SD Kronos fly trap as a young starter plant 2.5 years ago. It has been grown indoors using 16 hours per day of artificial light, and temperature is always room temperature in the 70s F.

The plant has never been allowed to go dormant, and it is now over 12 inches in diameter and there are traps growing on top of traps. Does this plant look like it is withering away due to lack of dormancy? It has a dozen 1.5 inch traps.l! In addition, I have 6 other pots with divisions from the mother plant growing in them.

The claims that dormancy is necessary are NOT true! At least not for SD Kronos.
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By Huntsmanshorn
Posts:  947
Joined:  Wed Sep 03, 2014 6:32 am
#353195
Yeah, the ICPS agrees with you see https://www.carnivorousplants.org/grow/guides/Dionaea
Also, they grow wild in Jamaica and many tropical growers in the know have good success without dormancy. All that said, I have tried this and had a big fail, so it seems like it can work but might not depending on your conditions.
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By Matt
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Joined:  Mon Apr 21, 2008 11:28 pm
#353201
Disagree. I've tried skipping dormancy for flytraps numerous times over the last decade or so. Venus flytraps that aren't allowed a dormancy always stall growing eventually, as your (Jagasian) SD Kronos is doing now based on the new leaves and how short and compact they are becoming. It is letting you know it is strongly expecting dormancy. It will almost certainly continue to regress unless it is given a dormant period. Repotting can trick them temporarily, but they absolutely do eventually need a dormancy or they will stall out entirely.

That ICPS article is written by John Brittnacher who lives just across town from me in Ashland, Oregon. I've visited John's place numerous times and seen his Dionaea grow set up. His Dionaea get enough ambient light from the east-facing windows he has that they do enter a very light dormancy due to the shortening of the days in the winter, despite the constant photo period he keeps them on year-round.

Also, to be clear, while that article is on the ICPS website, it really should be labeled as "the ICPS" since John wrote the article and, to my knowledge, didn't have it peer-reviewed by anyone else in the ICPS. Thus, it is only his opinion and personal growing experience he is writing about in the article. He is allowed to publish it on the ICPS website because he is the ICPS webmaster, but I wouldn't take it as the official opinion or stance of the ICPS.
Huntsmanshorn wrote:Also, they grow wild in Jamaica and many tropical growers in the know have good success without dormancy.
This is true, but Jamaica does have enough variance in daylight hours between winter and summer that it likely is sufficient to trigger some minimal rest period for Venus flytraps. See here:
https://www.timeanddate.com/sun/@512252 ... &year=2020

Shortest day of the year in Jamaica is 9 hours and 15 minutes in late December. The longest day of the year is over 15 hours in late June (on the solstices). That's a 6 hour difference in day length, which is more than sufficient to trigger dormancy.

I've seen a lot of growers in the tropical regions have some success, but they too almost always struggle with dormancy. Flytraps can grow indefinitely in tissue culture with the same photoperiod, so it is possible for them to skip dormancy. But what actually happens is that they will peter out and more or less die and then start growing anew again from the rhizome (or any plant tissue in tissue culture). Once they do that, they seem to be able to grow again for about 10-14 months and then they will peter out again and start to decline (like the SD Kronos in the photo is doing).
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By Benny
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Posts:  530
Joined:  Thu Jan 16, 2020 9:46 pm
#353204
In areas with little or no change in season, Flytraps have been grown without dormancy. This is because he the time a plant starts dying fr ok lack of dormancy, a division replaces it. However I would say that anywhere else they need a dormancy.
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By Matt
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Posts:  22523
Joined:  Mon Apr 21, 2008 11:28 pm
#353208
Benny wrote:In areas with little or no change in season, Flytraps have been grown without dormancy. This is because he the time a plant starts dying fr ok lack of dormancy, a division replaces it. However I would say that anywhere else they need a dormancy.
@Benny - spot on and much more succinctly stated than I was able to do :D
By Jagasian
Posts:  200
Joined:  Mon Jan 22, 2018 1:16 am
#353211
I feed my Kronos blood worms and it divides regularly. The original division may have died, I can’t tell because each new division creates more divisions.

Every year I post here about skipping dormancy and everyone tells me the plant is going to die over the next year. Maybe 2.5 years isn’t enough and it will die this year? Or maybe it will keep making new divisions and continue to thrive year after year.

How many years do I have to do this until people admit that dormancy is not required?
By Huntsmanshorn
Posts:  947
Joined:  Wed Sep 03, 2014 6:32 am
#353212
sanguinearocks101 wrote: Sat May 02, 2020 9:16 pm If they do not need a dormancy why have they not spread to warmer areas? Is there a river or other barrier preventing them?
Well, it has been introduced into warmer areas much further south (and north for that matter), but why it won't spread on it's own is a bit of a mystery.
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By francisfaustino
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Posts:  201
Joined:  Thu Sep 01, 2016 3:46 pm
#353222
Matt wrote:I've seen a lot of growers in the tropical regions have some success, but they too almost always struggle with dormancy. Flytraps can grow indefinitely in tissue culture with the same photoperiod, so it is possible for them to skip dormancy. But what actually happens is that they will peter out and more or less die and then start growing anew again from the rhizome (or any plant tissue in tissue culture). Once they do that, they seem to be able to grow again for about 10-14 months and then they will peter out again and start to decline (like the SD Kronos in the photo is doing).
I am part of a carnivorous plants group on Facebook in the Philippines which has a tropical climate. I've asked one person there how they deal with dormancy. He told me that the VFTs naturally die back but returns after a period of time. At the time, I didn't really know what he means or if the die off and re-grow was synchronized to a certain time of each year or some other consistent cycle. I didn't asked him. What Matt said makes absolute sense and backs up what people over there experience with VFTs.
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By Benny
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Posts:  530
Joined:  Thu Jan 16, 2020 9:46 pm
#353223
Jagasian wrote: How many years do I have to do this until people admit that dormancy is not required?
I have already heard they live through their 2nd skipped dormancy, and die in the 3rd. Plus, you titled this thread "Fly trap dormancy is NOT necessary " but you are speaking of a cultivar. Sure, SD kronos may be more dormancy tolerant, but I guarantee you that eventually, whether it be 3 years or 20, the plant will die, whether you like it or not.

We aren't shooting you down because we hate your idea. I am sure many CP grower would be more than happy to know dormancy is NOT needed. We have to be skeptical in order to rewrite something that has been around for a couple hundred years correctly.

Basically, 2.5 years is not strong enough evidence for everyone to agree.
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By Copper2
#353227
I think Jagasian may have a point. After all many believed and still do that you need to grow VFTs in humidity domes which is incorrect!
By mcgrumpers
Posts:  254
Joined:  Fri Jan 11, 2019 4:39 am
#353228
Matt wrote: Sat May 02, 2020 9:16 pm This is true, but Jamaica does have enough variance in daylight hours between winter and summer that it likely is sufficient to trigger some minimal rest period for Venus flytraps. See here:
https://www.timeanddate.com/sun/@512252 ... &year=2020

Shortest day of the year in Jamaica is 9 hours and 15 minutes in late December. The longest day of the year is over 15 hours in late June (on the solstices). That's a 6 hour difference in day length, which is more than sufficient to trigger dormancy.
Well this is fascinating. If dormancy can be triggered simply by varying photoperiod, that could be done with grow lights (indoors). Not having to kick my VFT out for the winter would be convenient... I'm willing to try this out next winter.
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By _-SphagnumFromHell-_
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Posts:  702
Joined:  Mon May 28, 2018 5:02 pm
#353229
I find the dormancy thing with Venus Flytraps to be interesting. It's sort of connected to the indoor vs outdoor conversation that starts out simple, but turns into a can of worms once you start looking at different experiences.

By all means I'm an advocate of growing them outside will a natural dormancy. It's way easier and the right path for beginners, but I don't think it's the end all be all that some treat it like. I've witnessed a good few manage some good growing with highly controlled conditions and have appeared to do well long term. A good example is someone named paulsflytraps here on the forums. He grows his under LEDS, then gives them a refrigerator dormancy when the time is needed. Whole process inside. And judging by his posts he hasn't seem to have run into any issues.

I think what's happening here is the plant is given conditions so rich that it's dividing like crazy. The divisions are given new strength to go on a little longer as their internal clock is newer. Once their stretched to their limit there's already more to come and the cycle continues.

Regardless, I want to see this conversation continued in the future to find definite evidence on the limits of dormancy. I may contribute some experiments myself.
By omnipercp15
Posts:  352
Joined:  Sun Apr 19, 2015 11:58 am
#353232
I think Matt mentioned something which many people don't realize about.

The shorter photoperiod is what triggers the dormancy, not cooler temperatures. This could mean a plant experiences this even when we thought we weren't doing it explicitly, since every hemisphere still experiences a shorter day time period, even without colder temps. Even in the case of the plant having its own plant light but near a window, that could create some condition in which the plant detects a change in photoperiod.

But to answer another question posed by OP -- to verify something like this, you would need many samples, need to explain how you're going to measure health, need to control photoperiod for some plants (test group) and need to allow others to go into dormancy (control group), check the results for many long-term years, etc As an example, some of the measurements could be related to, how many divisions might the plants make, how large the traps get, to name a few things, as well as other typical marks of a growing and maturing VFT, etc. Because there seems to be some allowance for saying the following where everyone can agree to some extent:

1) maybe the original plant has died, and what we see are new divisions
2) maybe the original plant dies back significantly, which may represent a form of its own self-hibernation when not allowed to do so naturally, then it grows back as normal, meaning it never technically died, which is always what we think is the result of no hibernation
3) some plants grow OK out of their optimal region or care but that doesn't mean don't do optimal care for them, if you can help it

Anyway these are just some quick thoughts on the matter. It is something which will be a topic of contention for a long time.
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