FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

hello every one, i do have a VFT and i plan to put it into hibernation. ive had it for a few months since july or so. i have limited options to put the plant into dormancy. i live in a loft unit and i live in Montreal where dormancy outside in winter is out of the option. i dont have any locations where the temp and lighting conditions are correct. id go put it in my parents' coldroom (12c) but the temp is marginal and there is no sunlight, the window covered for heat retention. i dont have a clear option for VFT dormancy atm and i'll need some advice to put it dormant. the fridge is at 7c, its not an ideal solution but i cant think of another way. i havent put it into hibernation yet atm as i need the advice to find a way to safely hibernate it.

These pages should help answer most of your questions:

http://www.flytrapcare.com/venus-fly-trap-dormancy.html

http://www.flytrapcare.com/venus-fly-tr ... orial.html

ive already looked at those links before making the post here. my only option seems to be the fridge but those sites dont mention much on how long i need to transition the plant in regard to temp. i figure a few weeks in the garage 15c before going to the fridge is preferable.

Do you literally have no light in the cold room? If you have a window that could get the VFT 4-5 hours of sunlight, that would be okay...

there is a window but its not towards the sun in anyway. its faces the home beside it and the angle doesnt privide anything more than ambient sunlight. my parents have the coldroom wall surounded by pink insulation. there is a actual window there but they do cover it by a removable peice of insulation.

the 7 day forcast so far doesnt go over 11c and no higher that 1c from saturday to wednesday. the next 2 nights are below freezing. i could still try outside transition though it would be a initial 14c drop in temp and a rushed transition. thought its risky at this point and not sure if the plant would like it much at all. i admit now that i took VFT hibernation issue a bit too lightly without considering hibernation preps ie put plant outside for hibernation putposes. i can provide transition temps for the plant but not the sunlight requirements baring a 30 minutes of artificial lights cumilatively.

Everybody, Some flytraps live on my desk where they sunbathe in front of a florescent bulb that gives them 200-watts worth of light, and the other VFTs sit at the transparent door that leads to my outdoor porch. They're all sprouting new growth , too, including the droopy one you saw if you've rad my topic called How Sick is my Royal Red. What should I do if they're still growing fast in December? Since they need to hibernate in their own refrigerator, should I put them into it to force them to hibernate? The new petioles are a huge relief, but I'd hat to think that the plants would die because they skipped dormancy. Thanks.

Bill

It is that time of year here in NJ and this is the first winter I've had my traps so can they be stored in an unheated shed for the winter by a south facing window? Temperatures below 32 F are not good, right?
I've been putting them in my car during the night when it's been 30 - 32 degrees then taking them out again since it's warmer (40's) during the day.

I just want to make sure they make it through safely.

Neogami wrote:Hello,
I'm new to owning Venus Fly Traps and am confused as to whether I'm killing mine or if it's entering dormancy. Being late October, it would stand to reason that dormancy is the cause of my plant's decline, but it doesn't seem very healthy looking, so I'm unsure.
Here are the conditions of the plant up until now:
*Bought at a nursery about two weeks ago
*Transplanted after three days to terrarium along with a mini fern. I water all with a tiny bit of boiled tap water.
*After one week the plants all seemed happy, and the humidity in the terrarium seemed about right
*4-5 days later, I noticed a slight layer of mould growing along the soil (cactus variety) in the entire terrarium. I removed the cover, and removed as much mould as I could. All this time and currently, plant seems just fine. One trap at most starting to turn black
*Yesterday, many of the smaller leaf stems starting to turn black, and leaves with traps look wilted and slightly yellowish. I read that the amount of light it is getting may not be enough, 800 lumens 12 hours a day. I move the light closer to the plant, and water slightly with distilled water, still with the cover off.

Today my plant doesn't look any better than it did yesterday, and may look a bit worse, as in, more limp and wilted. Is there something I'm doing drastically wrong? Could temperature or humidity be causing this at all? I also checked the rhizomes (turns out there's three tiny plants) and they look alright. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
VFT Yesterday:


VFT Today:


Close-up:

I am FAR from experienced but your potting medium looks quite dry. You can give it a good soak in distilled or rain water for a couple of hours then let it drain and see if that helps at all.

Hi
I have some questions about dormancy.

I've started to gradually give my plant a little less water and light to prepare it for dormancy, but I'm uncertain on how to proceed now. The options are several and I'm not sure how big drop of degrees it can survive at once.

Some brief info about the status of the plant (venus flytrap) :

- main plant 15 cm (5,9 in) diameter pot, 15 leaves reaching the edges, still growing new leaves and replacing old at a steady pace, but a not as fast as during summer.
- flowered in early autumn, stem 28 cm (11in), no signs of withering yet, 7 ex-flowers , 4 of which i can see shiny seeds on without anything covering them.
- tiny plant beside it, 5 leaves, not growing.
- S-SW-facing window + lamp
- 23°C (73.4ºF)
- reduced watering and lamp-light since the beginning of November


Climate info where I live December to January

Average temperature: -2,4ºC (27.7ºF)
Lowest last year: -18ºC (-0.4ºF)
Highest last year: 7ºC (44.6ºF)
Hours of sun: 1.33...

My options:

Temperatures measured this evening

-outside: 8,5ºC (47.3ºF)

-freezer room, window (N-NE), 17,2ºC (63.0ºF)
-hall upper part, windows (N-NE & N-NW) only far above (unreachable) 19ºC (66.2ºF)
-hall lower part, dark, tiny, narrow and blurred window (E-SE) 18ºC (64.4ºF)
-attic, windows (E-SE or W-NW), 11,8ºC (53.2ºF)
-garage, window (E) 9ºC (48.2ºF)


So my plan is freezer room+lamp 10 days followed by attic+lamp untill february/march. However I am not sure if this is the best solution. The attic might get too cold and the freezer room might get cold enough too late to keep it dorment for 2-3 months. Perhaps I should construct some plastic cover too keep the hot air from the lamp around the plant?

What do you recommend? I'm really puzzled right now.
Any help is welcome and thanks in advance!

/Svarog

I recommend the refrigerator. Constant 40 degrees F. Light not needed.

Dormancy in NY Northern part of ZONE 7. Hey guys, I'm going into my 2nd dormancy growing flytraps and I remember the stress I went through trying to figure it al out last year. I'm not going to say I'm an expert, and you cant use my method just anywhere either, but I will say it worked great for me. I currently have 7 VFTs.

FTS Maroon Monster
Jaws
B-52
Fused tooth
FTS Crimson Sawtooth
Sawtooth
WIP Slim Snapper

Which all fit in my giant windowsill. I actually HAD 15 of them, 6 were offshoots of the ones I had, 1 was the first typical I ever bought, and one was a seed grown that I gave to my dad for his birthday. The rest I gave away because I only wanted one of each for variety. They keep dividing! lol. Now to the point of my post.

After stressing myself all over the place trying to decide how to go about dormancy I found The simplest solution ever... a drafty windowsill in my living room and an acu-rite thermometer. I can keep them in the same spot all year long and by cracking the window a little bit I can get the temp where it needs to be. Right now it is 37 degrees outside, by cracking the window I can get the temp in the windowsill to 50 degrees. When it gets colder (below 30) I will bring them inside on the window ledge, crack the window and close the blinds over the plants, that way it will even out. The MOST important part is Styrofoam cups, to insulate them. This way the temps wont change when a hot breeze from the apartment or a cold breeze in from outside hits them.







Works great for me, they get sun all year round and in the spring the more adult ones will be put in 6" deep plastic pots and placed outside, while the younger ones that still fit in the windowsill will stay there. The window is Southwest facing and they get plenty of sun. At the end of that season they will go back in 20 oz styrofoam cups for dormancy.

nycibbyryder wrote:Which all fit in my giant windowsill.

You're really lucky then. My windowsills are less than 3" deep and my house is totally surrounded by trees. Fortunately though, I have a whole unfinished basement where I've closed all the heat registers to keep it as cool as possible...
I'm supplementing my CP's and other small plants with fluorescent lights because that sliding glass door faces northwest and it also has a deck overhanging it like an awning so it gets no direct sun at all. I also use a digital thermometer to keep tabs on everything.

I guess each person just has to find what works best in their own situation.

Most of my VFTs take after their daddy: They're insomniacs. These days, I can hardly sleep a wink. Neither can they, I guess, because they look the way they looked the day they hopped into bed, i.e., into the fridge, on November 23. Should they sit by the window until they begin to die back? The nurseryman I usually buy from told me it was okay to refrigerate them to force them into deep dormancy, so I did that after I squirted each plant with Safer brand fungicide.

I guess I am just looking for a "yes this is normal" or "you've got a problem" kind of answer..

I am growing under the Badboy lighting system that Veronis recommended, I have been keeping them on a 16hr light-on schedule.. I recently dialed back my lights and I am now at 14hrs working my way to 12. My other plants look great,still green, not much growth, but look more or less alive.. except my Pink Venus.

After the first dial back most of the traps started looking a sickly.. then their traps closed and began blackening. This is my first time throwing one into dormancy so I am a little shaky..

edited to add: I probably wouldn't be concerned if the others looked this way too, but it's just this plant and it happened so rapidly..

It looked like this just before the first dial back:


and it looks like this now:


Normal for dormancy?

Cthulhu wrote:Normal for dormancy?

It would be better to see a photo of the whole plant, but I can't see anything in the photo that looks alarming to me. The Pink Venus appears to be losing its summer traps like all flytraps do as they go dormant. I can't really see much in the way of new growth, which could be a slight concern (though sometimes flytraps just don't put out much new growth when entering dormancy) but the photo doesn't show the whole plant either. Perhaps there is new growth on the plant that I just can't see...