The Carnivorous Plant Bog Blog

Weather weather weather.

2012-01-26T14:39:00.000-08:00

Ah winter. No wait its not winter. Uh I think it is. Snow! No Snow. Snow! Thunderstorm? 40 degrees? It's spring! No. Weird fall? No. Winter? Yes. But it can't be? Sure is. It's January 26 and it is a weird winter indeed. I have no idea what this is doing for the plants, but it can't be good. Though you might think that a warm winter is good, often it can mean increased fungal activity and rot of rhizomes. That is why I use sulfur. Sulfur? Yes. It's not just from eggs anymore. It's one of the safest fungicides on the market, and I use a lot of it.

After a quick dusting of the bog it's good to go! The sulfur almost completely will prevent any fungal growths on the very sensitive rhizomes.

Since the bog is in zone 5a I have to insulate it in the winter. Most other websites advise a system of heavy mulching. I am very lazy though, so I try a whole different approach to winterizing my plants. The bog, as I'm sure you know, is divided up into two parts, the dirt side and the pond side. To prevent any very deep freezes (most North American CPs hate extended freezes under 20 degrees Fahrenheit) I use a pond heater and a temperature sensitive plug (about 30 dollars for the set). The pond heater will prevent the pond from freezing, and the temperature sensitive plug turns on at about 33 degrees Fahrenheit and turns off at 35. I then cover the bog with some plywood to insulate it. This keeps the bog right at the perfect temperature and the fungicide prevents and fungal growth.

The plug setup with the thermo cube

Stay tuned for the next bog post about the new greenhouse!

Happy New Year!

2012-01-08T17:25:00.001-08:00

Hello 2012! Goodbye 2011! In with the new, out with the old, as they say, (they being the mystical powers that may be) and this year there is going to be a lot of new!

New bigger, better greenhouse

New bigger, better bog

New bigger, better plants

New more interesting growing techniques

Crazier experiments

Giant plants and less death (crossing my fingers on this one)

A hybrid of plants that can walk! (wait no that's not right...)

I hope you are as excited to see the progression of the CPBB as much as I am!

Merry (Late) Christmas!

2011-12-26T12:47:00.000-08:00

Well it's that time of year again when everything is dark and bleak there's snow on the ground and the plants are all dead. Oh wait, no I must be in the south because there is no snow or anything. The weather here is a balmy 44 degrees Fahrenheit. The plants are under their protective wooden blanket with a temperature activated pond heater to keep the bog temperature from dropping beneath 20 degrees. All the plants can handle it, but it's better to be safe than sorry. On a different note, I'm coming up with a plan to make a new bog. It will be much bigger and not as weedy (I hope). Details will follow soon. Also the greenhouse is being rebuilt to account for more plants. I want to sincerely apologize to those of you whom have been waiting for me to blog, its been very busy lately but I will make sure to make the blog and the MWCPS a priority. Pictures of the bog will come very soon! Thanks for your support.

And I'm Back!

2011-11-11T09:12:00.001-08:00

Sorry guys about the brief hiatus. While I was gone, a couple plants died when the pump that circulated the water in the bog, and there were a couple plants that died because water level in the bog was a little too high, also I think that the location of the bog is not sunny enough. Enough said, I'm probably gonna move the bog to a nicer place. You can probably see why I haven't blogged a lot. Anyway, I've been super busy working on the MWCPS so you should join it that way we can have our first meeting.

Leuco Hybrid from the Bog

2011-09-28T17:40:00.001-07:00

Twitter and the MWCPS

2011-08-07T08:24:00.000-07:00

Hello all! I just created a twitter page @cpbogblog so go ahead and follow me! I'll talk about stuff that may or may not pertain to carnivorous plants, but hopefully stuff you guys will find relatively interesting. Note: I do not have a personal twitter so my tweets might be awkward at first. http://twitter.com/#!/cpbogblog

On a different note to all of you CP lovers in the midwest, the Midwest Carnivorous Plant Society is being organized. We have a forum: http://midwestcps.proboards.com/ and if we get enough interest a website will be created. I strongly encourage you to make an account on the forum, this will help tie the community together and create stronger basis for regular meetings and a convention somewhere down the road. Thanks!

That Little Bugger!

2011-07-20T19:31:00.001-07:00

So today I found a bug inside one of my Darlingtonia pitchers. "Isn't that good?" you might say but it was not an ordinary bug, but a very ferocious and hairy caterpillar. After repeated attempts with a toothpick and some manicure scissors I finally retrieved the wretched insect from its comfortable home. Unfortunately for it, I killed it; unfortunately for me, the damage was already done.

The little bugger itself

The damage done

Seconds from death

Hope no one else has this problem! Good Growing!

No more room

2011-07-16T14:18:00.000-07:00

Well I didn't want to make another bog (maybe next year?). So I decided to extend the existing one further into the pond side. Here's how it was done:

Before any work was done:

First I shifted all the existing rocks to the right to create a ditch in the bog.

Then I filled the ditch up with a 1:1 ratio of peat to sand mix with a little perlite. I topped it off with some long fibered Sphagnum and now I can plant even more plants!

Now to get some more plants...

Webb's Mill Bog

2011-07-11T19:40:00.000-07:00

First of all, Happy July! I have been on vacation in NJ so I apologize for the lack of posts. Well, today I took a little trip to Webb's Mill Bog, a bog in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. This is my second trip down there and it is one of the coolest bogs I have ever been to. I highly recommend going there if you live in the area. They have Drosera intermedia, rotundifolia, and filiformis. It is located on the border of the Sarracenia purpurea ssp. purpurea and Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa, so some cool forms and color patterns emerge. They also have Utricularia, which I believe is U. cornuta. Enjoy the pictures!

The view upon entering the bog.
The water level was about an inch lower than last year.

Drosera filiformis with Sarracenia purpurea in the background

It's the attack of the Triffids!

Utricularia cornuta...I think

S. purpurea with almost vertical traps

A D. rotundifolia hides amongst the Sphagnum

It's not carnivorous... but it looked cool

This S. purpurea almost has the coloring of S. flava var. rubricorpora

Some cool looking Sphagnum...

I would call this one S. "Easter Island" do you see it?

A floating Sphagnum mat with the remnants of a pine tree

Drosera intermedia

And the plants are reproducing well!

A nice healthy seed pod

D. rotundifolia

D. filiformis with prey

Is it a x courtii? Probably not, just a small purpurea

Another mat of plants

The bog upon leaving

Early Phyllodia and Aborted flowers

2011-06-29T21:16:00.000-07:00

Phyllodia are non-carnivorous leaves produced by Sarracenia when a plant is under a significant amount of stress and in the winter. And it has been quite a stressful spring. At least 4 tornado watches, a day where the temperature went from 98 to 60, flooding in the bog, other plants dying of fungus infection, and searing heat. Well all those terrible conditions have done a beating on the plants. I can distinctly see how weather has taken its toll. 50% are producing early phyllodia and I have no idea what will happen to them (it looks like there are no new leaves in the near future.) Enjoy some pictures of distraught plants...

A semi-phyllodia on S. leucophylla

Some plants haven't even produced a working pitcher yet

The second part of this post is of course aborted flowers. I'm not talking about flowers that I chose to kill, I'm talking about flowers that never happened. Sarracenia rubra is the plant in mind. In an earlier post I mentioned that only the rubra was left to flower, well it still hasn't, but it looks like it will. So that's where we are. Oh and to add on to the madness, some of the Dionaea flowers also killed themselves off with the heat, so I guess I didn't need to cut off the ones that I did.

So the buds kinda look the same as when they first came up...

A seared off bud on a Dionaea plant

Well I hope everyone else has better growth conditions than I, so I bid you good growing!

Flowers and Death

2011-06-16T20:51:00.000-07:00

Well it seems we are at the end of the flowering season here, only the rubra ssp. rubra is left to flower,

and I am ready with some leucophylla hybrid pollen for it. Because of the annoying lack of flowers this year, I decided I would leave most of the pollination to the bees. (If you don't know how to pollinate a Sarracenia flower, here's a good link http://thepitcherplantproject.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/how-to-pollinate-a-sarracenia-flower/)

Of course with life comes death and I think that because of the wetness of this spring, and the awful weather several of my Sarracenia got fungal infections. There were three casualties (gladly just unnamed hybrids) and a 'Ladies in Waiting' that I think that I will lose.

A little tribute to the rhizomes lost

And with death comes life again

Sarracenia oreophila 'Sand Mountain'

Sarracenia "Excellens Giant"

Ahhhh! (part 2)

2011-06-09T11:41:00.000-07:00

Some knocked over Drosera scorpiodes

The world has to be kidding me right? Well last night I was watching T.V. and all of the sudden up pops a little message on the screen. So I switch to the weather channel and look at what the forecast says. A cold front is coming in with hail. Yesterday's high was 95 degrees, the low was 73 degrees. Today's high is 61 degrees and the low is 50 degrees. It feels like somebody is trying to destroy my plants. It knocked over all of my Drosera scorpiodes (which might not recover from its roots) and knocked some of my Sarr flowers down (gladly not off). To add on to this I'm pretty sure my mexican butterworts are not liking any of these wild temperature changes and are looking quite sickly. Hopefully nothing will die, but I don't have my hopes up.

Now that's a cold front!

Ahhhh!

2011-06-08T11:37:00.000-07:00

Well if you couldn't tell from my tone, I am thoroughly upset. Summer has come way too quickly, and is basically killing off every single one of my flower buds. Already I lost that flava bud that was previously mentioned and now my 'Ladies in Waiting' just died too. So besides unnamed hybrids with flowers all I have is a S. purpurea ssp. purpurea that has pink petals! Pink petals are highly indicative of S. rosea or a backcrossed hybrid. So the making of new little Sarracenia plants looks to be greatly inhibited this year. And on top of all of that several of my greenhouse plants that I put outside look like there going into shock and the mexican butterworts are all shriveled from the heat. This early summer is bothersome.

It's Here

2011-06-05T18:10:00.000-07:00

Summer is here. The temperatures around here are crazy. They are so crazy that some of the pitchers on the Sarracenia are flopped over because the temperatures partially dry out the pitchers and decrease the water pressure that helps to keep them upright. I just moved the plants from the greenhouse outdoors and to the bog and another area that will receive hard water as a test (its just some Pinguicula and Pygmy Drosera.
It kind of feels like spring took about two days and now summer is here just like that. Yesterday the high was 90 degrees F two days before it the high was 67 degrees F. So the temperatures are crazy, just crazy.

Of Tornadoes, Open Pitchers, Flowers, and New Plants

2011-05-30T12:00:00.000-07:00

Today is the first day in three days that we haven't had a huge storm system come through our area. It seems that every day now a severe thunderstorm alert or a tornado watch pops up onto my T.V. screen. Unfortunately the weather has done a small toll on the bog. A couple of newly opened S. oreophila 'Sand Mountain' were knocked down in the storms after they filled with water. The bog also flooded a bit and buried a small venus fly trap and a D. intermedia, gladly they'll survive.

A partially buried Venus flytrap

On a happier note, the first pitcher in my bog opened about a week ago, a Sarracenia oreophila 'Sand Mountain' (the same one that toppled in the storm). It looks like another week or so before any other of my plants will open up. Gladly though, my venus flytraps from an earlier post just opened their first traps of the season and are sending up flower buds (I know this is controversial, I'll post about it later).

The first opened pitcher in the bog, Sarracenia oreophila 'Sand Mountain'

A newly opened Venus flytrap trap with a small bud visible in the center

Flowers are also starting to open up! An S. flava bud is being, lets call it "reluctant." It's about to open up, but it still hasn't turned over yet. I had to stake it up for fear that its own sheer weight would brake the stem. I'll see how that works out, it doesn't really look too good. Anyway one other plant, and unknown Sarr. hybrid opened up completely and marks the first opening of a flower. Sadly though it's not in my bog and is being sold off to a friend, with part of the proceeds going to the ICPS.

A reluctant S. flava bud

The first Sarracenia flower

I doubled the amount of plants in my bog with random hybrids from California Carnivores, from the NASC auction, and from a trade at terraforums.com. I also got some new plants from Meadowview Biological Station in Virginia and I can't wait to see how they'll look with pitchers (they cut them off to ship them). Check out the growlist to see what I got.

Happy Memorial Day!

A huge Darlingtonia pitcher, can't wait to see it puffed up

Quite a Large Storm

2011-05-22T21:14:00.000-07:00

Well even though the rapture didn't occur yesterday, today a pretty large storm came through with some tornado watches and severe thunderstorms. Nothing seems damaged, but the pond will definitely overflow out the side of the bog as it does in most heavy storms. Earlier today, I also added a ton of Sarracenia to the bog as divisions from multi-growthpoint rhizomes that I got from California Carnivores. I absolutely can't wait to see how it will fill in and hopefully it will look nice.

An Unfortunate Incident

2011-05-21T19:41:00.000-07:00

Sadly in an accident the flowers of a Sarracenia leucophylla, oreophila and a Darlingtonia lobbed off. Even though the flowers will not grow back until next season, the plants seem okay and no new leaves were damaged.

Reflections of a Carnivorous Plant Bog

2011-05-19T17:35:00.000-07:00

(literally reflections)

A little lesson on Darlingtonia pollination

2011-05-16T20:15:00.000-07:00

First you lift up the petals

At the very top the anthers with the pollen are visible and the stigma is the cool starfish thing.

Basically to pollinate this you take a paintbrush and dab some pollen from the anthers to the stigma.

You are done! Congrats, you have pollinated a Darlingtonia flower

A paintbrush with pollen on it!

Some Darlingtonia Flower Pictures

2011-05-13T20:12:00.000-07:00

Yay! Hurray! It's finally May!

2011-05-07T13:12:00.000-07:00

Get ready for exponential growth rate! It's been way too long for all the plants in dormancy and now that the danger of frost has pretty much passed and the days are hours longer than the nights y'all better get ready for an explosion of growth. My Darlingtonia californica is flowering (pics to come soon) and almost every single plant in the bog is sending up new growth. I can hardly wait for another month when all the plants are at full power! Also, I don't think I killed anything! So that's your update for the week.

S. flava Bud

2011-05-01T18:03:00.000-07:00

New flava bud with oreophila bud in the background.

NASC Benefit Auction

2011-04-23T07:41:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! Today at noon starts the North American Sarracenia Conservancy benefit auction at terraforums.com. Basically other people around the world list items and then you bid on them. Whoever has the highest bid at 10:00pm on May 7 wins the item and the donor ships the plant to you. You can send a check to the NASC or pay through paypal... I think. Anyways the money made goes to the NASC which helps to save carnivorous plants in the wild, something all plant growers should take to their hearts. I believe this year they are sending the money from the auction to Boiling Spring Lakes, NC to help save their carnivorous plants from destruction and poaching. Happy bidding!
http://terraforums.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=132 .

Really? I mean Really Mother Nature?

2011-04-18T17:33:00.000-07:00

We got snow today. Like actual snow, no, not just like it snowed and then was gone, there was snow on the ground and it stayed there. I mean really? It is April 18, and this just makes me mad. The snow melted, but still it was 34 degrees out when it was snowing, thats like impossible for the snow to stay! Stupid snow ruining my day and possibly setting back plant growth, I'll never know.
Well I hope the rest of you guys are having better weather.

Trying to be Artsy

2011-04-14T15:07:00.000-07:00

I took the following photos a week ago... Hope you enjoy

Stuff to do...

2011-04-04T15:50:00.000-07:00

Well, this past weekend was pretty busy in the bog; I installed the Darlingtonia pump that recirculated water from the pond into the section of my bog with D. californica. That in and of itself was a pain, it was clogged with algae and I had to blow the algae out of the pump (Yuck!). I'm also noticing flower stalks on the Darlingtonia,

Darlingtonia Flower Stalk Emerging

the Sarracenia flava, Sarracenia oreophila

Sarracenia oreophila bud

and in the conservatory, Drosera burmannii, and finally Drosera capensis.

Drosera capensis buds

Spring Arrives!

2011-04-02T14:37:00.000-07:00

It seems that spring here has finally arrived, the weather forecast predicts no more freezing temperatures as the low for the rest of the year. With this comes the spring cleanup and opening up of my bog. As I explained earlier, my bog is not mulched, but a simple pond heater does the job of keeping the bog warm in the winter. About two weeks ago I unplugged the heater and now the time approaches where I can take the cover on. After speaking with Jacob Farin of Sarracenia Northwest, I have decided that I will take the cover off during the day and put it on at night, that way frost doesn't do too much damage to the plants. I can also see changes in the greenhouse, as the plants are producing more pitchers and there is more dew on the sundews.

To buy, or not to buy.

2011-03-23T19:01:00.000-07:00

That is the question. As spring approaches many of the major carnivorous plant nurseries release their plants that are about to come out of dormancy. New cultivars, plants not yet registered with the ICPS, and rare temperate plants are sold which brings me to the unfortunate dilemma of whether to buy or not to buy. Unfortunately, I have not been growing Sarracenia long enough to make my own hybrids so buying is my only option, but with a limited budget deciding what to buy is a becomes a long search for the best deals and plants.

Oh Shi*

2011-03-10T14:41:00.000-08:00

This sucks, bad. I got home from school today, and I opened up my bog (its covered with plywood in the winter to keep it warm) and noticed steam coming out from it. I felt the water, and it was over 80 degrees! It is currently 37 here, and I had put a pond heater in the pond to keep it warm in the winter, but its only supposed to get as high as 40. Gladly none of the plants are harmed (I hope), and I spent a while draining the pond and refilling it with cold water. I hope that the plants don't come out of dormancy too soon.

The Blog is on Facebook

2011-02-28T21:00:00.001-08:00

My blog is now on Facebook, and I invite all of you to become a fan of the page. Thanks!

50 Venus Flytraps

2011-02-27T19:49:00.000-08:00

Today I got 50, thats right, 50 Venus Flytraps in from Meadowview Biological Research Station. They were in great condition, and I strongly advise you to check out their website. I also received two Drosera rotundifolia, two D. intermedia, and two D. filiformis. All these plants got in the bog today, pictures follow.

Plants straight from Meadowview

My Venus Flytraps

See all the little green blobs? The Flyraps look pretty happy!

Though they look small now, they should get pretty large in the spring and I hope to see flower stalks on them. Fingers crossed.

Pictures from the Greenhouse

2011-02-19T23:32:00.000-08:00

I thought I might show you guys a few of my greenhouse pics.. Enjoy!

Pinguicula moranensis

Pinguicula moctezuma

Nepenthes eymae

Drosera multifida extrema

Drosera scorpioides

Drosera burmannii

Pinguicula moranensis

Welcome

2011-02-13T19:46:00.000-08:00

It has seemed you have stumbled upon my blog, I am not sure what this will turn into, or even how to write a good blog, so bear with me.
For starters this blog is about how I grow carnivorous plants in northern IL in both my outdoor bog and my greenhouse. I have been growing carnivorous plants since I was 6 years old with a very sad little venus fly trap. Now my modest collection has about 50 plants divided up around 30 different species of both indoor and outdoor species. I am starting this blog in winter so in the beginning there won't be too many pictures but I will try to post once a week or so. Currently my bog is in complete dormancy and has only been alive for one season and I am not even sure if it will survive this winter, we'll see how that goes.