FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hey all, quick question.

I just replanted two of the VFT. One of them is a week old purchase that came in one of those tiny pots, and another is a rescue that doesn't seem to be doing well that I posted about in another thread.

I know you're supposed to plant it so that the rhizome is JUST below the surface, and since in the past with my rescue I had it potted too low, I want to check with you experts if they look ok now, just in case.

Plant 1:




Plant 2:

Looks good to me. From the looks of the last one, it may be stunted. I have had plants before that lost all of the grown leaves and just stopped growing, although the rhizome looked fine. It may take several months, but if you just leave it and keep it damp, it will usually sprout a new growth point.

@Panman has the right idea. They look potted just fine. I think that the second one suffered some sort of rot, but I am absolutely positive it will come back from the Rhizome. I have had VFTs that I thought were completely dead, but they would come back from the Rhizome as new plantlets.

Sounds good, thanks for the help again you two!

And yeah, I swear, that last one is so strange. It's one of the ones that came in a death cube at Lowes, got it a little over a month ago. You helped me out with it in the other thread I posted, but this thing is just so odd, I guess you're right and it's just stunted.

When I was repotting it, I took a look at a part that Mike said looked rotted and there definitely was this weird part that just looked dead at the bulb, so I cut it off before replanting. It does keep sprouting out new leaves, they just keep turning really waxy and red, then don't grow any more.

After I got it home from the store I just kinda tossed it out in the super bright sun without acclimating it (beginner's mistakes) and most of the original leaves just died off. It then started growing some nice big new leaves, the ones that are in the pic, but then after it grew 2 big leaves, that are still on it, it kept growing new leaves that only went up a little bit and then stopped. I guess maybe this was due to me originally planting it way too low.

Fingers crossed I get it right this time with the watering haha.

These are some of my rhizomes that have been stalled since last fall. They spent all winter under lights and are just now starting to do something. I will put them through dormancy this winter and will split them up in spring.

Hey guys,

I was getting some peat moss and perlite at Lowes, the same one where I got this VFT, when I went to their VFT section and found that they got a new shipment of VFTs that actually looked healthy, and I realized that some of them were actually that one Dente cultivar I've seen mentioned while researching VFTs, so I couldn't help but buy one!

When I was repotting it from the really bad looking sphagnum moss it came with, it suddenly turned out it was two plants! Immediately just split into two plants as soon as I put it into the water to wash off the moss on the roots.

It also turned out there was a bunch of heads and rotten looking things underneath the moss buried, so I had to take some scissors and trim it all off. In the end, I had two healthy looking rhizomes with a few traps, and just potted them in a 50/50 peat moss/perlite mix.

However, the smaller of the two is a bit weird, one of the long leaves on it is leaning off to the size like it's about to split off kinda, while still attached to the rhizome. Because of the way it's leaning off, it's exposing the rhizome. I'm not sure if I should just put some peat moss over it and bury that part, or if it's ok just leaving it kind of exposed? Not sure if I should tear that leaf off, as I don't think it has its own root.

The plant after I purchased it:


Repotted after it split into two plants:


Leaf leaning over and exposing the rhizome:

They look good. You mentioned getting peat from Lowes. You didn't get Miracle-Gro brand, did you? That brand has fertilizer in it.

Panman wrote: ↑Thu Jul 22, 2021 11:19 am They look good. You mentioned getting peat from Lowes. You didn't get Miracle-Gro brand, did you? That brand has fertilizer in it.

That's good, I was just like whoops, did I leave the rhizome out too much, is it gonna die? First time I've had a plant turn into two plants! Will the plant just take the exposed part and grow out from there and make a crown or something?

And yeah, I made sure not to get Miracle-Gro! I got the Majestic Earth one, giant ass cube of peat moss for just like 12 bucks. They only had Miracle-Gro perlite, so I had to go online to buy fertilizer free perlite there.

This is my first time doing a 50/50 mix of peat moss and perlite, so it was kind of weird since all the pre mixes I've bought online so far seemed to skimp on the perlite. I had soooo much perlite in my mix, I guess it helps it be really airy for the plant! Downside is that the perlite floated to the top when I watered it for the first time to get everything to "settle".

It floating to the surface is my one big complaint about using perlite. Topping the peat/perlite with LFSM seems to help. I want to swap to pumice instead, but it is way more expensive. HD usually carries the Viagro perlite and a giant bag is $12.

I looked at your photo again and see what you mean about the rhizome. You might give it a little wiggle and push it down a little, not much though. If you can toss some sphagnum around the top, that will protect the rhizome and keep the perlite from floating away.

If you bottom water (which you should), you can leave the top 1/4 inch or so open when you place your plants in the pot. Then top off the last 1/4 inch with just sphagnum peat moss, which will leave a nice looking top layer. If you end up flushing at some point, some perlite will eventually surface.

As Panman suggested, long fiber sphagnum moss works well too. I did find over time that it will get a bit slimy with algae, but it is easy to pull off an replace as needed.

I have accumulated too many plants (I did not just admit that), so I just gave up and stopped using any "covering" and just deal with the unsightly perlite.

Brian

Panman wrote: ↑Thu Jul 22, 2021 5:45 pm It floating to the surface is my one big complaint about using perlite. Topping the peat/perlite with LFSM seems to help. I want to swap to pumice instead, but it is way more expensive. HD usually carries the Viagro perlite and a giant bag is $12.

I looked at your photo again and see what you mean about the rhizome. You might give it a little wiggle and push it down a little, not much though. If you can toss some sphagnum around the top, that will protect the rhizome and keep the perlite from floating away.

I have some spare LFSM left over from the plants that came with them, so maybe I'll top it off with them.

I'll try pushing it down a little bit. It's just in a really odd position because the leaf that's in the front, tilting towards the camera, is kind of tilting away from the plant and it's making it a bit hard to push the plant down, since it keeps leaning away and exposing the rhizome.

bcavanau wrote: ↑Thu Jul 22, 2021 6:09 pm If you bottom water (which you should), you can leave the top 1/4 inch or so open when you place your plants in the pot. Then top off the last 1/4 inch with just sphagnum peat moss, which will leave a nice looking top layer. If you end up flushing at some point, some perlite will eventually surface.

As Panman suggested, long fiber sphagnum moss works well too. I did find over time that it will get a bit slimy with algae, but it is easy to pull off an replace as needed.

I have accumulated too many plants (I did not just admit that), so I just gave up and stopped using any "covering" and just deal with the unsightly perlite.

Brian

That's some good advice, I'll definitely do that next time! All the perlite at the top is making it kind of hard to bunch the peat moss around my plant's rhizome, haha.

Update, took some left over peat moss and squished a little bit over the exposed bit. Couldn't find the LFSM so it looks like this now. Hope that's ok and doesn't mess up the crown:

Potting height look ok here? I had this repotted already a month ago but for some reason the peat moss was "cracking" and kept sinking into the pot, and the plant kept tipping over sideways, so I lifted the part the VFT was planted in and lifted it up without disturbing the roots and packed in some more peat moss/perlite mix underneath to get it higher up so it didn't keep hitting the edge of the pot.

The plant was growing at an odd angle too, kept tipping over sideways sort of so the leaves didn't stick up. When I was moving it I saw that the roots were still underneath the main growth area, but it didn't have any roots under one part of the rhizome, which I guess is making it unanchored and tipping over.

Nikson wrote:Potting height look ok here?

Acceptable, but I'd suggest pushing it down another 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch so that none of the whitish/pinkish rhizome is visible as it will grow better that way. It will do fine as it is though.

Matt wrote: ↑Sun Aug 15, 2021 3:35 pm

Nikson wrote:Potting height look ok here?

Acceptable, but I'd suggest pushing it down another 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch so that none of the whitish/pinkish rhizome is visible as it will grow better that way. It will do fine as it is though.

Tried my best to push it down a bit, but man this thing is unwieldy. It's so fat and has a lot of new growth coming out now haha.