FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hi everyone,

I had bought a VFT about a month ago and kept it in its original container. It was doing great with new growth all over and even flower stalks on two of the plants (it started to divide). I decided it was time to repot the VFT and followed direction I found on this site. However where I am from I have a really hard time finding soil ingredients that aren't miracle grow and have extra nutrients and fertilizers in them. For some odd reason I could not find peat moss anywhere unless it was miracle grow, I searched everywhere for sand with nothing in it but couldn't find any and I have had issues finding perlite as well. I read on a site that using sphagnum moss would be okay if you just cut it up into small pieces. I did this and repotted the VFT. It has been a couple of days now and all of the leaves on the VFT are turning brown and the plants appear to be dying. I have no idea what to do as the VFT is in the same location it was in and I use distilled water. I really don't want this plant to die but I have limited access to soil ingredients for this plant.

Please help!

Thank you

A picture would help figure out the problem. It could just be stress from repotting. Did you rinse out the sphagnum moss well before potting? It can have minerals etc that can hurt the plant.

Yes I rinsed the moss before using it, coudl it be from just using the sphagnum moss?

Another thing that is very concerning is that a lot of the traps have also turned black and are now gone.

Hopefully the photo is working now.

Thank you all!

Your picture didn't work. Sphagnum is a great media for flytraps. It's normal for old leaves to die off and turn black. As long as the new leaves coming from the center are nice and green then the plant should be fine. Did you slowly acclimate it to sunlight or just put it straight outside?

If you can get a photo posted, it would be fairly easy to give a diagnosis.

Hopefully my picture is working now. Not sure why it wasn't.

I still can't see the photo.

I see the picture, looks light starved to me.

They definitely need much more light. The long leaves and tiny traps mean they're light-starved Also, flower stalks aren't necessarily a good sign- sometimes stressed plants will flower in an attempt to produce seeds.

Long-fiber sphagnum moss can be used as-is, there's no need to chop it up.

Do you think the browning of leaves is from lack of light as well? I thought it was getting enough light in the window it was in, I had it in a window that got the most light possible in our house. I think I am going to try to slowly transition it outside but do you think that will be too much shock on it?

Thank you

@thepitchergrower:

Why not? It's recommended by a lot of people who are experienced in growing them, and seems to more closely emulate their natural growing conditions; I've been standing them outside in full sunlight and filling their tray with 0.5-1 inch of water, seems to work well.

steve booth wrote: ↑Wed Mar 30, 2022 9:37 am @Yates - Difficult to tell from the photo, are you sure that the moss is Sphagnum, looks like it could be carpet moss. Where did you get it?
Cheers
Steve

Uh, @Yates post is five years old... @Lotsofplants tagged onto an older post. And, I was wondering the same thing about the moss...package label images sure help in times like these.

It seems that it would depend on climate/weather and time of year in regards to flytraps standing in water. I'm not sure who it was, probably a few people, but my mindset has been formed that flytraps like their feet wet but don't want the water up to their knees. In HOT weather I keep roughly 3/4"-1" of water in my trays due to fast evaporation...but I will let it dry down before adding more, occasionally top-watering...this is during HOT weather. During milder weather I simply top water every couple of days if the pot gets "light in weight". I haven't gone through a winter yet, but my plans are to use minimal water during dormancy during that period.

Looking closely at your image it looks to me as though the moss is hydrated and I *think* I see water droplets on a leaf and on the rim of the pot. The wrinkled surface of the leaves tend to make me think that at one time the plant was severely dehydrated. Follow Chef's suggestions, he's been doing it a while. As for bagging the plant, an easy way I've found to do this is get a zip-lock bag that is large enough to fit around the pot and slit the bottom seam open and slide the pot down into it...the open/cut bag bottom allows the pot to take water from the tray and at the zip-lock at the top makes a great way of adjusting the ventilation for more or less humidity and fresh air. But really, any bag will do as long as you can adjust the opening a bit. The pot in this photo (5") has the bag pulled down close to the surface being as I've got some sundew seeds planted inside it. The bag can be pulled up higher to accommodate the height of growing plants if needed. I use cheap gallon-size dollar store ziplocks...they seem to fit 5"square and 6"round pots pretty well.