FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Nice!

Well, just read this thread and wanted to properly introduce myself as I didn't introduce when I entered the forum, which I normally do.
My name is Marco Acuña (a man, not woman, maybe, lots of people think that because of my username). And as I have said sometimes in the forum I'm a engineer in Biotechnology from Costa Rica, actually working as a lab assistant while I get my second degree at college and attending my carnivorous plant nursery, which I have the link in the signature.
The carnivorous plants are a almost recent topic to me because they're almost inexistent in this country, so that is another reason for having the nursery, to share the plants and knowledge for low cost to a wide public. The main reason there are no nurseries or this plants here in the country is because costarricans are really cheap, and only a select and little group would pay for whatever price you may see on the web for this plants, even more, potting substrate is not available here, except LFS which is stolen by birds during this precise season (as I'm watching them stole some while I write this), and then the missinformation, no one, of the few I got to know that sold the plants once, years ago, told any customer the vital importance of water, the non fertilizing, light nor any other requirements the plants have, so, people placed them as any african violet and would die..
But, enough about it lol, I may tell I'm passionate for any plant, eversince I have memory and grabbed a handful of beans and poured them on my mom's plants just to harvest the cotyledons!, then I expanded the collections with cacti (which I had outside in the 3500mm of rain we have here) and always lost all of them until now that I do not try to "addapt them to the rain!". I am a self learner, and that way I have learned to harvest vegetables and fruits I planted myself eversince I got a 300m piece of land in front of my house, year 2000 was the date aproximately. As the cactus do not take tons of space, all the rest is taken by diverse rose varieties, geraniums, african violets (which I plant and care but my mom says they're her's), citric trees, water apple, chayote (sechium edule), arazá, banana, guineo, plantains, guava (3 colors), cinamon, cassaba/mandioca/yuca, tarp, sweet potato, and well many other tropical vegetables and fruits and ornamental plants I do not even know the name (here names are inexistant to plants, neither care guides nor anything). With all of that I grew in the botanical area.
But I have many other interests as are reading, photography (amateur), videogames (faded nowadays), collections (stamps, coins, bills, glass bottles....), candle making, I know how to knit with 1 or 2 needles, traveling to nature. I am not a sportsman because I do not take the time to do it, but I have a good condition in running or swimming, which I sometimes practice, hate football and any other masive sports, also transnational companies, and nature destruction. I get only what I need to accomplish my specific task or goal and nothing else. Not particularly social (parties with loud music and drugs=including alcohol) but really friendly and good with everyone, willing always to have nice chats on different places or having small house parties-meetings. I am and I recognize I'm egocentric (well, only childs are sometimes this), a bit perfectionist, but this I say that no because I like to live easy and not stressed.
After my collections also I ended up listening one day to a radio program about aquariums, and that they had a forum in my country, and that was when all started, learning the good source for information and knowledge or opinion exchange site could be internet, specially forums, so in that aquarium forum I started my aquarium hobby, now I have 12 tanks ranging from 115G to less than 1G. Then I ended up in another forum, but of beekiping, which I would really like to do when I finally get to buy a small plot far away from people so the african bees we have to deal with do not affect nobody, and actually I have a hive of Tetragonisca angustula stingless bees at home.
My good growth of the carnivorous plants started when I by some mean got in the ICPS site and read it whole, by then I had VFT, capensis, tokaiensis, 3 nepenthes and 4 sarracenias (all species, in number I never like to have 1 but a lot of plants) and I then started selling the plants, (with cactus I started in 2004 selling, but CPs in 2007) as the membership of the site was high and my mom made me to have fears of buying online (well, also I did not have money to do so) I just have become member of the ICPS and the messemb study group (yes, lithops, another hobby lol, but my climate seems to make it have a stop, I do not have enough cold for them), and then came the Tissue culture, when I finally decided to open a nursery fully stablished with service to the whole country, not just a local and house sale, I saw I needed to make some TC. My college studies prepared me for that and I have had a good start, as I beleive, at least with none to very few contamination, the problem is having plant material to work with.
Then while looking for information I read articles, but they are not as good for a home tissue culturer, so I found the ICPS forum, then the WOC-ex forum, and finally the FTC forum, which I see is the best of the three, where I am now, always learning and still having to master many other different CPs!
I don't like photos, but here is one to add, from a trip to Austin this january with my parents to visit my mom's best friend:


PD: I must mention I like to write and give too many details with weird detours and subtopics inside!

Wow. Very detail write up . I know you better now and you're good looking too. Too bad I'm a man and I'm married

Fingered from my Galaxy Nexus

Well, thanks, normally girls tell me, but thank you anyway. I read your story also, I would be crazy to go that fast on a motorbike!

Hi there~~~

My name is Lexie and I'm 20 years old. I grew up in Hanover, Maryland.. and .. I AM GROWING UP TOO FAST!i remember playing in the sand box.. with a hose.. making tacos out of leaves and sand.. haha. Anyways.. I currently live with my boyfriend in PA. I guess you could say I'm unemployed, though I am selling things online through ebay/amazon here and there. I'm on my computer a little too much, but it's what I enjoy, whether its a PC game, Stronghold Crusader for example, or a online game.. Oh and the xbox 360 is way better then the PS3 Call of duty all the way ~~

Also.. I'm a big gambler and that's the one thing that scares my boyfriend! Most people are waiting for that 21 age to drink.. NOT ME! I'm headed to the C-A-S-I-N-O to the crap table!! Speaking of drinking. I've never been drunk in my life and I'm proud of it! Never smoked either My boyfriend is quite the opposite! Though our interests are pretty dead on.. Except he doesn't gamble... and he doesn't like ghost adventuring.. Another thing I like to do.. I haven't done it lately but I've been to some Insane asylums with recorders trying to capture EVP.. and taking pictures.. I was in North Carolina with a friend of mine at Golds Burrow cemetery and captured the picture down below. You can see a hand sticking out of the tomb.. clenched in a fist.. You might have to actually copy the image to your computer and zoom it, it's far back. I was just snapping random pictures and this one caught my eye instantly. Another time I spent the night at my neighbors house which was empty with my brother and my friend. He said hes had a lot of strange experiences.. So we were laying on this hard floor, freezing to death, and all of a sudden I heard 2 stomps, like boots.. coming up the stairs. I then said to my friend "Did you hear that!!!!" And all I heard was snoring. HAHA.. And my brother didnt' seem to really care .. Another time we stayed there, it was my cousin and her friend.. I had a recorder going, a music recorder actually.. and .. I started talking about the attic, saying we were up there earlier.. and in the background there was a voice "Are you following me?" in this high pitch, little girls voice.. I have a youtube video if anyone would like to hear it!

Oh and about the music recorder.. My dad bought it for me to use for singing/playing guitar. I do both and play piano as well. Hes always like " I bought her that damn thing to play music on and all she does is GHOST HUNT with it!!!" Haha

.. I also LOVE ANIMALS! I think that's what has me really interested in venus flytraps.. They're more then plants.. to me. I just recently got into growing them less then 3 months ago.. and I already have 5 pots going across my window.. and now I'm out of room!!! But I WANT MORE!!!! Anywho, I've always loved animals, of all kinds. Snakes.. frogs.. rabbits.. lizards.. birds.. horses are my favorite.. cats.. dogs.. You name it, I'll love it! Back when I was little, I'd go around and pick up rocks looking for toads. Those were the days! And going to the creek and catching salamanders and crayfish.. and avoiding the big mean snapper turtle.

So .. games.. animals.. ghosts.. music.. venus flytraps..

And its sad! I still don't know where I'm going in life or what I want to do as a career.. I just hope one day in life it'll hit me.. before I'm gray and old!

Almost forgot! My awesome cat.. She is actually at my dads house right now, I couldn't take her with me when I went to my boyfriends house :'( I miss her! Everytime I'd come home she'd pop out of the backporch and come up to me as I open my car door and jump in the car.. And I left her :\ And ... Shes a bad kitty..

My dad got a really nice palm tree like plant for like $40? At lowes or Home depot, and for some reason my cat just keeps jumping in it and peeing and pooping right in the dirt! Will come from outside.. and jumps right in his plant!! Causing the palm to die and the leaves to brown.. I went over his house last week and he had a paperboard I guess you could call it? around the pot .. :p

Oo and I love clouds! They're so beautiful! I'll see one and think .. I wish I could paint that. Or .. just snap a photo of it.. my iphone 4 doesn't take the best pictures though.. so it never takes the picture of what I'm actually looking at. One time it was this light pink color and it had a circle, with ripples around it, kind of like a UFO came through the cloud haha.


OO! I forgot!! I took a picture the next time I went to North carolina with my friend to the graveyard, thinking maybe I'd get another picture! This time I snapped a lot more and once again, saw instantly in the corner of the picture.. and it looks like a women standing looking at a grave, but others thought maybe it was someone on a horse? Check it out!

Very nice write-up.

So wonderful to see all these new members!

Well, that a question I often ask myself!
My name is Dan I am 51 and I live in Wilmington, NC. I work for a local community college in the Geology Dept and also manage the largest collection of Native American artifacts in the state college system. I grew up in Vermont but spent most of my life living in the west. I moved here from Medford, Oregon just a few miles from Matt and Leah's town after living there for 14 years. I was an artist and custom furniture maker until one day in 2000 I jumped over a 3 foot fence and shattered my right leg. Long story short, I had it amputated in 2002 and 10 months later I cycled across America for the first of three times (very Forrest Gump of me).
I spent 7 years cycling 28,000 miles in 14 countries bringing hope and awareness about limb loss.
I did tons of media events and charity rides and even was a guest on Larry King ( he really is not that nice in person)
I co-authored one book on Cape Fear River Indians and working on a children's book on the local VFT's
Returned to my home in NC in 2009 and went back to college, then hired by the college.
Still in school and working on my Masters in Social Anthropology, hope to make it to Dr before I am ready for social security.
I got involved in flytraps 3 years ago when my boss asked me to help out Stanley Rehder and his Fly Trap Frolic.
I still commute 12 miles to work by bike each day.
We never had children and my spouse is a museum curator and works on the Battleship North Carolina. I rarely get to the beach it seems. even if it is only 3 miles away.
Children ask if a flytrap ate my leg when I am leading garden tours. I just smile.

Hello all, my name is Manish and I am from India. I love travelling. I Ike reading, listening to music, swimming, running, sports and I am a gadget freak. I love collecting different kinda gadgets.

I'm Chris, 18 yrs old from Texas and going to be getting my degree in comp sci. I'm not a fan of putting too much info on the internet so that's all I'm interested in sharing.

Nice to get to know you all

Hey guys!!
My name's Jared, 16, and I live in Jacksonville-ish Florida.
I started growing my first VFT about a month ago, and I find it extremely interesting! I dream of one day getting, like, a massive greenhouse full of em', but for now I'm stuck with just one VFT. (Elvi*)



* I named each individual trap Elvis, (seeing as there was no way I could name EVERY trap) and therefore I refer to all the traps as a whole "Elvi".

My name's Mark. I'm 20 and currently going to college. I'm close to finishing my Associates degree and once I'm done there I may transfer to another school to become a veterinary technician. I currently volunteer at a vet's office, since it is part of the requirement to get accepted into that program. Other than that I love exotic animals and animals in general, I keep tarantulas as "pets" and I am very defensive about them when people hate on them (I try not to be though). I also watch too many movies.

Well, my full name is Cristan Yanez. I am a Hispanic fourteen year old. I live in Fort Worth, Texas, and I just love Venus Flytraps. I got my first one from Amazon a month ago. I was very exited it came with five jaws, four of them open, one almost fully open. Well that is when I came here, I enjoy the website that Matt has here, and I think it has really helped me. I have improved within my experience of growing Venus Flytraps, especially over here in Texas, since it is very hard to grow one of these tropical plants over here, with this extreme heat. Anyways, I ended up killing my first plant since I had no idea what I was doing, I was just so amazed at the plant. The first time I ever fed my first VFT it's first meal I was very disappointed, I picked a large meal for one of the jaws, it was a tough black beetle, it hard a hard exterior, the plant closed on it, and the beetle was fully inside of the jaw, I watched it for about a minute or so, then I started seeing the jaw move a bit, I saw it slightly opening from a side of the jaw, I thought so myself, "Nah, the plant will squeeze even harder if he tries to get out", but I was wrong, the beetle was just to strong for my small Flytrap, that it ended up opening the jaw and escaping.. Later on, I thought I knew what I was doing, so I took some soil my mother had bought for her nice roses, but didn't know that Flytraps did not like nutrients or any of that sort in their soil, so my ignorant self took the VFT out of it's pot, and threw it away(I thought it was useless), I made a large hole in my back yard where the sun was so extreme, just hitting the VFT with sun-rays everywhere and the plant was not even fully grown, anyways I planted her and put the soil around the VFT, I thought the plant was going to do great. Well I went in my garage to try to find some other things that may help improve the plant's growth, I found some old fluid that helped plant growth, so I thought it would help my VFT, I mixed it with some bottled water(I was giving it bottled water the whole time I had it), and just pour it all over the VFT, I should of asked before doing that, I actually ended up asking after I did, which I find stupid now, well someone responded after three minutes of me posting the question, they told me that it was horrible for my plant, that it would end up killing it, they told me to flush it down with water, and I had no distilled water nor rain water plus I didn't know that bottled water affected them, so I got a full bottle of water, and poured it all over the top of them, one of the jaw's even turned brown after about five minutes of the fluid pouring! Well, I left my plant there for about two days, she did not seem healthy at all, that is when I was told that bottled water was hurting my plant, along with the soil. So I took her out, got a big pot, and took some soil from some other plants my mother has, which was also enhanced with a fertilizer/ I put the soil in the pot, along with the Flytrap, that was the last of my poor first VFT, the next two days most of my jaws were black along with my leaves, I took a picture of it, and put it on the forums asking for help, they told me the plant was not dying naturally, I was very depressed.. The next day all of the jaw's were completely black, along with all of the leaves except for one that had a little green on the leave, my front neighbor told me to try to open the Flytraps mouth, and put a bug in there for the plant could get some energy, I attempted that, and the jaw I tried it on just snapped and fell off, it was very dry and hard, I knew that the plant was almost dead, so I just left it alone, I was very sad... The following week the black was just dead, it was all black leaves and jaws, I took the pot and withdraw-ed the dirt and plant from the pot, there was nothing, the roots were not there and the plant was just dried up. People were correct, the fertilizer and the fluid that fed the Flytrap, killed my roots and my plant. Well, now I know most basics and I have six plants! One is a mature VFT, another one has a grown trap, and the rest are just the rhizomes, each rhizomes has a new leaf growing, they are small, but there coming! Well, I'd like to thank everyone who has helped me improve, and Matt for creating this amazing magnificent website, which has helped improved within the growing of the VFT's. My birthday is coming and I told my mom if she could take me me to this carnivorous plant show in San Antonio, she might take me! Also, I hope to get a bit of plants for my birthday, they are selling them at Lowes, but who knows if they will still have them on October, if not i'll order some from here! (:

I figured I might as well introduce myself ^-^ My name is Monica, I'm 22 years old, I was raised by my father a Marine. I currently attending a Junior college and transferring to Fresno State next semester. I'm very shy and find it hard to talk to people, so people see me as antisocial. I love to read, paint, draw and make things. I'm a huge Horror movie and story fan, Stephen King is my absolute favorite author.
I guess that covers it , thanks for reading guys :]

I suppose I'll tell all of you about me when I get home this afternoon All my pictures are on my laptop, lol. I'm currently at school (tenth grade. For sure. Always get confused as to how old I am. I'm not alone on that, right...?).
Ooh! I have the first post on page 30!