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Share your worst plant disaster

  • Thread starter PlantAKiss
  • Start date
  • #21
If anyone here read To Kill a Mockingbird, it said that mockingbirds don't do anything bad. I suppose that isnt true!!

As for me, I've lost some basal shoots, an adelae and some vfts from lack of paying attention and care for them.
 
  • #22
i've heard of that book , i heard it is good but i believe that it is nuttin but a pile of BS
 
  • #23
All this cat stuff was quite amusing.


My dad is allergic, so I don't have any higher animals in the house as of now(the farthest up the rung we've went was a rabbit).

Even though I don't own cats....they LOVE my backyard(for different reasons
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). They enjoy leaving ID cards on the lawn, and perhaps they've stolen fish...though Im not going to blame them for that because Ive seen egrets and green herons fly in and out!
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  • #24
Oh great... now here's my story... even though you all know about it..

I had gotten a five foot tall, two foot wide, mobile greenhouse with three metal mesh shelves, a zip-up vinyl covering and wheels for my birthday back in July of this year. I had moved all of the plants into this and put them out into the sun. This was much better for me because I had previously had them out front on the side of the brick planter and had to individually move them out into the sun every day, which became tiresome after more and more plants added to the collection. This way I could just roll them all out at once every morning. I didn't think about the fact that the whole greenhouse WITH THE PLANTS IN IT is only about 25 pounds (yet top-heavy, so I didn't try to pick it up myself to move it into the house if I needed to for any reason). And the wind wasn't very friendly, especially with the vinyl covering over it, zipped down, catching every bit of wind. You could see what was coming. Stupid me. Lo and behold, later on that day, I looked outside and didn't see it sitting where it was in the middle of the patio. I looked around and finally saw it, all the way FOOMED across the patio, knocked over, leaning at a weird agle against the screen of the porch, which is next to the patio. Every plant was flung out and almost every one uprooted and upside down on the ground, the soil and broken roots scattered throughout the litter of old leaves, raiwater and other organic what-have-you at the edge of the patio bordering the screen porch. My heart fell like a brick and I got to them and picked up the biggest ones first and plopped them back into their pots with the soil that was left around the roots that were left. Then I got to the smaller ones, the primuliflora (whose flower was snapped of), the cobra lily, the sundews, and others. I repotted them without adding soil, as not as much of their soil was gone. I misted off the dirt all over them and discarded the many snapped off traps, leaves and pitchers and put them back in the greenhouse and added the soil that was needed. I hoped they would recover and all. The VFTs got the real blow from the whole incident somehow. All of them did extremely bad afterwords, growing extremely slow and producing soon-dying leaves and tiny, deformed, barely-there traps. The others recovered. Well, most of them at least. The ping, the cobra and a couple others died. The VFTs lived, but even up to this day aren't the same. They aren't doing much better than they did in July at all. Looking at these VFTs right now, it's impossible to believe that last year they were booming with growth and one and a fourth-inch traps that actually lasted LONGER than half a day. Now I'm paranoid and no matter where the greenhouse is, in the sun or under the overhand at night, it is hemmed in and kept in one absolute spot by two wooden workhorses, one on each side. And all because of a little gust of wind that sent the greenhouse zooming across the patio... STUPID WIND!!
 
  • #25
The funnist failure I had was when I first started growing cp's. First plant I had was a vft. I was about 13 years old. I quickly killed it by playing with it too much and basicly not knowing how to grow it. My second cp was also a vft, but this time I was 26. I again quickly killed it, by not knowing how to grow it. I gave it well water and I didn't give it enough sunlight. I know you are thinking this is not really that funny. The funny part is that both times I lived in Southeastern North Carolina. Right in the middle of the vft growing range. All I had to do to get the plants to survive was to put them outside.
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One other funny/sad story happened to a guy that I sold plants to. He was 15 years old, He bought a vft from me. The next week he came back and bought a S.purpurea, D.intermedia, D.capensis and a D.capillaris. He asked me if I could get other plants for him. I said sure. He ordered over $70 worth of plants. I can't remember what all he ordered, but he ordered alot of plants including S.flava, S.minor, S.rubra, a ping, a resurection plant a sensetive plant, ect ect ect.
I sent him an email about a month later and asked how his plants were doing and he told me that his sisters cat ate all of them, including the roots. I felt so bad for him. I know $70 was alot of money for a 15 year old, so I offered to give him some plants for free and if he wanted to order more plants I would sell them to him at my cost, but he told me he didn't want anymore until he found a way to keep his sister's cat away from them. I even offered to help him build an enclosure for the plants but I guess he never regained his interest.
 
  • #26
lol Cats seem to figure into these disasters in a big way.
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I wonder which is worse...cats or squirrels.
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  • #27
For me that is a easy choice,,squirrels, Cat's have killed 0 of my plants squirrels have killed hundreds.
 
  • #28
Well, I think most people here know my story by now. Basically, My mother killed my whole collection, including some very large rare nepenthes. I'll never completely forgive her for all the time, energy, and money that has now gone by the wayside.
 
  • #29
Yeah, I have repeated my story a bunch of times, too. But sharing helps me feel better. Basically, I dropped a N.rafflesiana on my N.campanulata (about a year ago) while pruning, and decapitated it. It did not recover, and was quite a tragedy in my small world. Someday I will purchase another, and it will grow vigorously and be kept away from those dastardly, jealous rafflesianas.
 
  • #30
Sorry to hear that, trashcan. I really like my campanulata, and i can understand your feeling of loss.

I have something to add. It has been windy - not windy, blow your hat off windy, but windy, shake the house and blow tree branches off windy - here in Boston the last two days. One of my sarrs out on the fire escape will be getting a new cultivar name ... if i ever find it again. S. x'Dorothy'. I guess it's off dancing with the tin woodsman and scarecrow. *sigh*
 
  • #31
Someone will find that plant in their yard and say, "What an interesting plant, I wonder what it is?" Eventually, they'll find their way to these forums and you will have started a new CP addict!

SF
 
  • #32
Yuppersness...
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And then if they are some immature bleep, D. musc. will tell them it used to be his kindly and then they will yell in all caps "WELL I DIDN'T KNOW AND YOU DIDN'T HAVE TO BE TO RUDE ABOUT IT IT'S NOT LIKE I STOLE IT OR ANYTHING NOW YOU MADE ME MAD NOW I OFFICIALLY HATE THIS FORUM AND ALL CARNIVOROUS PLANTS GOOBYE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

*snickers and tries to hold back fit of laughter*
 
  • #33
Worst on ever for me was when my Drosera aliciae commited suicide....it tried to make 6 clones and 4 flowerstalks at the same time.......it quickly began to die and was totally gone in 1 month...so sad
 
  • #35
My worst plant disaster is the
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flower that my sister got me for Christmas last year (for the life of me can not think of the name. It starts with an A and it is a bulb witch produces flower stalks of about foot with red and white flowers.). Any how I potted the flower and watered the bulb for about two weeks.

I noticed a stem coming up witch was thick. So, I thought myself, thinking you need to cut the stalk to have it produce flowers. Without thinking I was running with scissors and I cut the stalk. About a minute later thinking why did I just do that? I knew I made a mistake...So I told my sister on the phone the plant is doing great. Well, the plant produced 3 more stalks. I was very grateful to see.

Well two weeks went bye and I had flowers just opening.
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 I came home from work saw the flower in full bloom. I was so happy and was going to take a picture and send it to my sister saying "Thank You for the nice plant". Well went to move the plant and dropped it on the floor and all the stalks broke. With that I kept the bulb and later dropped it again on the floor. At this point I got sick of cleaning up the soil so I threw it away.  About 2 months later told my sister what really happened. That to date is the worst plant story I have.

Travis
 
  • #37
D muscipula:

Bingo, that is it! For the life of me I could not think of the name. Thank you!
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  • #38
Elgecko, it says "WE CARE" on it!!!!! GAH! I can't bear the lies! The lies!! THE LIES!!!!!!! *tries to settle down her anger, then hears Kenny Chesney song come on radio and now needs to calm down again.... from excitement*
 
  • #39
yall have written about birds, squirrels, cats, people but no dogs...Here goes.

I had been at my obesssion about a year and a massed quite an expensive collection I might add. It was this May and all the plants were do exceedly well in the bog I built. A little background here, I keep my CPs at my office because conditions are perfect there with full sun, lots of room, abundant rain water off the roof and I am there to care for them. This space is in a warehouse that is occupied by artists who live there full time. One of the benefits of this space is I get to take my two 85 lb boxers to work with me everyday and there are other dogs there to play with. I digress. There is one particular dog that is less than well mannered and a bit wild. He had already gotten into the bog and dug it up the previous October when I was filling the bog with peat and sand. I should have known better. I told his owners to keep an eye on him when he was outside. Well, they didn't and 'Buddah' decided to do some digging one morning and this is what he did to my bog. As you can see there are tagged seed haeads as I had just completed my spring breeding program. I was sick to my stomach. I would have killed him had I gotten a hold of him I was so angry. I was mad at myself for not putting a fence up to guard my precious plants. Needless to say this same thing happen AGAIN a month later and darn if he didn't dig in the same spot and killed my S. rubricorpa and mixed the tags up on about 6 other plants. I still have not figured the names out yet. Now, there is a fence around the plants and 'Buddah' is gone! GOOD BYE! (no, I did not kill him)

dogdamage.jpg
 
  • #40
BAM!!! My plants BLEW up and I never saw them again. jk
-Captain Drosera
p.s. You'll NEVER guess my secret identity
Everyone has feelings
 
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