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Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2012 3:16 pm
by whatatypicalflytrap
Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Drosera Capensis is a very common species of Sundew plant. In fact they are among the most common of all Sundew species, this is because of how easy these plants are to grow once they have received favorable growing conditions. There are many different types of Drosera Capensis here are just a few of them:
*Narrow Leaf Form
*Typical
*Albino
*Red
*Wide Leaf form
*Broad Leaf form
*and Giant
There are many other types as well, but those are the most common. I, myself own a Drosera Capensis; Narrow Leaf Form. Drosera Capensis are a species from south Africa, in the subtropical region. Drosera Capensis can grow to be very eye-catching if grown into a healthy, mature plant. The only one problem with the Capensis species is that they have grown to the name of a weed in many sundew collections, this is down to the fact that Drosera Capensis grow very tall, slim and long flower stalks usually. This leading to the fact that each flower stalk produces many, many seeds. These seeds scatter themselves as soon as the seed pod has burst open and so many other Sundews will sprout. In most occasions Drosera Capensis can produce nearly 100 seeds or over, per flower stalk.

Give your Drosera Capensis subtropical conditions (as they are from subtropical regions) and keep within a temperature range of roughly 40-95 degrees F. However do not keep changing the position and place or the temperature of the Sundew it is likely the plant will not grow as nicely as usual and may die. Also, as a carnivorous plant the Sundew can go into dormancy, Drosera Capensis does NOT require dormancy if the plant can be grown all year round in subtropical conditions. If you cannot then it is probably best to put your plant into dormancy, just know this once you have a nice healthy Sundew it is hard to permanently kill your plant. The best temperatures for a Drosera Capensis to go through dormancy in are roughly 35-38 degrees F then once spring comes around the temperatures should warm up to around 40 degrees F. If these are roughly the conditions your Drosera Capensis is given then in the spring/summer you should have a nice healthy sundew coming back to full growing life.

Like many other carnivorous plants, it is very easy to get another plant from the one you already have. for example:
*Divisions
*Root Cuttings
*Leaf Cuttings
*Seed
First lets talk about Division:
Over time Sundews Form big clumps of themselves, usually when seeds haven't been collected and so have grown in with the adult plant instead of on its own with other seedlings/young plants. Or the plant could have just cloned itself when a healthy leaf had fallen or been ripped off and then grown roots. Like my Sundew it dosen't take long for the plant to clump itself, I have 11 plants and my pot. Next year I will divide them, 3 of my plants are adult and the rest are still small and haven't yet reached their full size. This is what it is like for most people. After dormancy, in summer when your Drosera Capensis has woken up and has resumed it's regular growing speed, it is time to divide your plants.
This is how to Divide Your Sundew:
*First take your Sundew and gently squeeze the plant out of the pot, be sure that you don't disturb to many leaves as you do this. Then remove the excess soil, again very gently, and you should be left with the root ball of the plants. Turn the actual plants away from you so it is lying horizontally in your hand yet the roots are facing you. Next, you are going to gently pull the base of one of the Sundews away from the others trying not to harm the roots. Set the plant aside and carry on with the others. When you are done you can fill a pot with Sundew growing media and plant your separate plants.

Root Cuttings:
Drosera Capensis have long, thick roots, and lots of them! So you can quite easily pull one of the roots very carefully from the plant. Choose a thick root to pull then take a tray of rain water or distilled water (this is the only water that Sundews are allowed) then let it sit there for 2 months at the least and eventually, when the root is showing signs of growth, you can plant the root in soil and a brand new plant will emerge. Quite easy, don't you think?

Leaf Cuttings:
Leaf cuttings are nearly as easy as root cuttings, except leaf cuttings take longer than root cuttings to form proper plants. To take a Leaf cutting just simply cut the leaf from as far down as you can. Then you can either place the leaf in rain water like you do with the root cutting, or you can put it straight onto the growing media. Please note: Putting the leaf in rain water will take a long while, more than 2 months to grow, whereas if you place the leaf directly into/onto the growing media and keep it very warm it shouldn't take much more than 2 months. Sometimes, however it does.

Seed:
Growing from seed in my opinion is the easiest, and the most natural way. Drosera Capensis pollinates itself and produces lots of seeds. Just scatter the seeds on the growing media and keep soil moist and keep the seeds warm. Sundews are fast growing from seed and if fed every 2 weeks or so it shouldn't take more than a year for them to reach maturity.

THINGS TO REMEMBER:
ALL Sundews MUST be watered with rain water or distilled water
Sundews will NEED re-potting or dividing every few years.
Keep Drosera Capensis at a rough temperature of 40-95 degrees F
Drosera Capensis are SELF-POLLINATING
Drosera Capensis produce MANY SEEDS and the seeds TEND TO SCATTER
Drosera Capensis does NOT require DORMANCY but can be given it if it can't be in the same conditions all year round.
HAVE FUN GROWING YOUR PLANTS!

Thank you, and HAPPY GROWING!

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2012 4:43 pm
by CPcaregiver
Wow, this is a really good article! Very helpful and well-written.
Thanks for posting this, I will definitely refer to here when I obtain D Capensis.

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2012 6:25 pm
by roarke
whatatypicalflytrap, good info except for leaf cuttings you cut the leaf, not puling from the plant (like you can do with venus flytrap).

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Fri Jul 20, 2012 8:09 pm
by coolg
Great article, might want to post it in the care guides section though.

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Sat Jul 21, 2012 5:18 pm
by whatatypicalflytrap
Thank you for the comments! I hope this article helped, and sorry about the leaf cutting bit, I get the Sundew and venus fly trap mixed up sometimes!Really sorry about that. I hope you liked the rest of the article though! :)

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Sat Jul 21, 2012 5:22 pm
by whatatypicalflytrap
I have edited the article to contain the correct information in the leaf cuttings paragraph.

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Sun Jul 22, 2012 7:10 am
by roarke
whatatypicalflytrap wrote:Thank you for the comments! I hope this article helped, and sorry about the leaf cutting bit, I get the Sundew and venus fly trap mixed up sometimes!Really sorry about that. I hope you liked the rest of the article though! :)
No worries :D , but you know that the leaf you put onto the growing media must have a bit of media on them, not to much, as to hold them.

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Sun Jul 22, 2012 10:27 am
by whatatypicalflytrap
Yes, I only wrote a basic guide so some of the details where missed out I think. Thank you for the comment though, and to everyone who reads my article; sorry if there are any mistakes! :)

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 5:01 am
by toysareforboys
How about adding to the guide: proper soil types, potting containers/sizes, watering techniques, food and feeding, etc.

Make it an "all in" care guide ;)

-Jamie M.

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 6:27 pm
by Cloudy Sky
this helps a lot! I was going to get more than one, but if they divide to the point of being weeds, then that changes everything! :D

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 6:59 pm
by Veronis
Just to clarify, I've successfully propagated capensis vegetatively using both leaf cuttings as mentioned in the OP, as well as by leaf pulling, where I pulled the leaf off like I would with a flytrap.

Great info, whatatypicalflytrap. Thanks for taking the time :)

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Sun Nov 11, 2012 10:58 am
by whatatypicalflytrap
Thank you for all your comments, I will take the time to make this article even better in the future! :D

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2016 5:15 pm
by edman007
I got a d capensis flowering right now. They don't really divide much if at all. They are considered weedy because they put out a LOT of seeds. Mine puts out about a stalk every two months, each stalk puts out about 15-20 flowers and I believe each flower puts out 50-100 seeds (putting it at upwards of a thousand seeds per stalk).

The seeds are also are very tiny, if you touch a ripe stalk it will drop enough seed to cover everything within 6 inches of the plant with carpet of seedlings. You are not going to be successful in preventing it short if preventing it from flowering completely.

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Tue May 21, 2019 9:09 am
by capensislover
Cloudy Sky wrote:this helps a lot! I was going to get more than one, but if they divide to the point of being weeds, then that changes everything! :D
Weeds? WEEDS? WEEDS!? :cry:

Re: Drosera Capensis; BASIC CARE GUIDE

Posted: Wed May 22, 2019 12:08 am
by Cross
capensislover wrote:
Cloudy Sky wrote:this helps a lot! I was going to get more than one, but if they divide to the point of being weeds, then that changes everything! :D
Weeds? WEEDS? WEEDS!? :cry:
ImageImageImage I'll take these weeds any day lol

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