FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

My new Venus Fly Trap is not looking too well...
It's gross and black. I have it in a cool room, i am watering it tap water and i have it in Miracle Gro potting mix.
I am doing everything that the local plant nursery told me to do. What am i doing wrong?

Here is a pic:

Hello and welcome to flytrapcare!

Unreverberating Man wrote:i have it in Miracle Gro potting mix.

While it looks like you're keeping your plant too wet, the Miracle Gro potting mix is your primary problem. If your plant isn't repotted very soon, it will almost certainly die.

For more information about proper soil read here:
http://www.flytrapcare.com/media-soil-f ... traps.html

Be sure to read the rest of the articles on the main site as well. If you have any more questions feel free to ask

Tap water is likely your second problem. Only water with distilled, reverse osmosis purified, or rain water. Most grocery stores sell gallon jugs of distilled water very cheap (~$1.00). Tap water 95% of the time contains too many dissolved solids (e.g. 150+ ppm). The types of water I mentioned have 0 to 15 (ish) ppm, which is what a flytrap needs - very low in dissolved solids.

Like Matt said, the potting soil is no good and is poisoning your flytrap. Flytraps do not like fertilizers of any kind. I'd recommend a 50/50 mix of sphagnum peat moss and perlite, or sphagnum peat moss and silica sand.

Don't use Miracle Gro brand anything for your flytrap (including miracle gro brand perlite, which has fertilizer in it).

Keep the soil "just damp", not wet. Flytraps don't like sitting in wet soil for long, as it causes root rot over time and will kill the plant. Don't let the soil dry out completely, but water less often. It's OK to top-water and let the soil become soaked; you just need to be sure to not water it again until the soil is just damp or even a little drier than that.

If you fix this soon, your flytrap will be fine, but from the look of it, it will probably take it about a month to recover. Be sure to rinse the roots with distilled water prior to repotting, to get all the miracle gro off, and try not to rip any roots.

Good luck!

I was doing everything wrong.

By the way, should I cut off all of the black leaves?

Unreverberating Man wrote:By the way, should I cut off all of the black leaves?

With all of the other huge problems you have, the black leaves shouldn't be even a small concern for you right now. If you don't like looking at them, feel free to cut them off but don't cut anything that's green.

Do you think that it would be better to plant it in my yard?

Unreverberating Man wrote:Do you think that it would be better to plant it in my yard?

No, sand contains some minerals that can also kill the plant. They need nutrient and fertilizer free soil, peat and perlite. I'm pretty sure you can find some at Homedepot or Walmart if you look really hard.

Unreverberating Man wrote:My new Venus Fly Trap is not looking too well...
It's gross and black. I have it in a cool room

Venus Flytraps during the growing season prefer warm conditions, even warmer than is comfortable for humans much of the time. Cool and wet promote rot.

Unreverberating Man wrote:i am watering it tap water

Almost all tap water will kill Venus Flytraps, some at faster rates than others. Although some people's tap water is low enough in dissolved solids (soluble minerals), this is rarely the case. Your tap water is probably poisonous to Venus Flytraps and other carnivorous plants.

Unreverberating Man wrote:and i have it in Miracle Gro potting mix

As others have mentioned, Venus Flytraps require a growing medium that has virtually no nutrients. Miracle-Gro _adds_ nutrients to almost all their products, including their sphagnum peat moss and their perlite. It's best to avoid Miracle-Gro products for carnivorous plants.

Unreverberating Man wrote:I am doing everything that the local plant nursery told me to do. What am i doing wrong?

The local plant nursery evidently didn't know what they were talking about, but for the sake of appearing professional they might have felt as though they had to act like they did.