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Whaddup everyone. I'm Daniel. I figured I'd introduce myself as I plan on becoming an active member of this forum. To be honest, this is the first forum I have ever participated in, and as such I am a forum newb too. My main interest in CP's are Nepenthes, but I have a few Cephalotus F. plants as well. I also like the North American Pitcher Plants and Heliamphora, but I have neither. My interest in CP's was first sparked by a random trip to Home Depot a little over a year ago. I have always had a green thumb (growing vegetables) growing up, but I never really knew much about CP’s. So anyway, I found myself in the garden center of Home Depot paying for some random items, when a VFT display case caught my eye. I had only tried keeping a VFT once before (around age 10), when me and my cousin got the bright idea to feed it a chunk of the greasiest hamburger meat ever made. The plant obviously died, and I soon became disinterested in what I then believed to be finicky plants. Keep in mind I was 10. So I thought about it, and figured for a couple of bucks I can give a new plant a try and maybe save it from its constraining cup/terrarium/coffin. I also figured I was a little more intelligent than when I was at 10. So in a classic impulse buy, I snagged a VFT from the case right next to the register. Crafty Sons'a'guns. When I got home I put the plant near a sunlit window and started the googlage. I learned all about VFT requirements, and then I stumbled onto an online CP store. I started by checking out the different VFT’s and then the Nepenthes caught my eye. I had never seen such crazy looking plants. So naturally, I whipped out the plastic debt-creator, and ordered two interesting-looking hybrids: N. Marbled Dragon, and N. Sabre. By the time they arrived I had read up on them enough to feel confident about being able to take care of them. And I did manage to take decent enough care of them. I made my ghettorariums out of an oversized pot, and its accompanying cheap clear plastic water reservoir. I simply placed the plastic reservoir over the top of the pot (offset for ventilation) and presto I had my humidity. I kept these plants for approximately 3 months before I had to move to a different house a few miles away. By this time I had added a couple other Neps (a Truncata and Ventricosa), to the CP mix. With those came a freebie drosera spatulata and binata (x2? = binata binata?). So I gathered my plants up and moved everything into the new house with my two roommates and one of their dogs. Previously we had no pets, so I did not have to worry about anyone messing with my plants. Shortly after moving into the new house I was repotting my N. Sabre and my VFT in the backyard. I left the dog outside for less than 30 seconds as I ran upstairs to grab something. I came back to a crime scene. The dog managed to maul the VFT to shreds and had ripped every pitcher off the Sabre and most of the roots. When I saw her she was tearing the leaves off of it. Words cannot describe how pissed I was. I must have barely turned my back to go upstairs before she began killing the plants. Even then, she had to defy the laws of physics to do so much damage in so little time. If she wasn’t so ugly/cute (boxer puppy), I probably would have euthanized her with a .45. Haha JK, I’m no Mike Vick. Anyway, the good news is, the Sabre actually recovered (with plenty of TLC), but unfortunately the VFT died and I have yet to buy another. I have a couple of pics of the Sabre recovering, but the earliest shot is some 5 to 6 months after the murder attempt, when I got my digital camera. I’m going to attempt to post a few pics… but keep in mind I’m new and it will probably just end up as a bunch of source code :banana2: . BTW sorry for ranting, it’s just that I’ve already read so much from the regulars around here I figured I would tell my story too.

This is my “Shelving By Design” Grow Rack (Purchased only a couple of days ago). I had been wanting these shelve types for so long (before the CPs) but could not find them until I came to this forum lol. Lowes pwns Home Depot (Lowes is a bit out of the way for me but worth it). Excuse the fire/shock hazard above the larger tank. I just put in two more lights on the very top and they came with short cords. I’m going to get an extension cord soon. Oh yea, the lights are off in this picture.
GrowRack.jpg


This is the larger tank up close, a 40 Gallon Breeder with a few different Neps in there.
40Breeder.jpg


Here is the 20 Gallon High with water and an ultrasonic fogger on the bottom. (I got the idea for the pots to raise the eggcrate from the JLAP (the pill popper?)… You know the guy that has a post in almost every thread… Heheh thanks for that.
20High.jpg


Keep in mind it’s hot as balls in San Diego right now (the T5 doesn’t help). This should be the last heat wave though, and then maybe I can coax the Rajah into making some pitchers for me.
If these pictures show up I will look into taking some of my plants for suggestions on improvement. I have a rafflesiana v. elongata I just got recently with the growth tip snapped and looking like a beat up prostitute. I contacted the store, about a week ago :poke: , and they have yet to get back to me :-( . I have a couple of other plants I would be interested in some feedback on as well. Anywho, I'm looking forward to getting to know all you fellow addicts. I think you're all just as sick as me and even sicker. :-D


Edit: Well, well, well. A convenient little Preview Post button. I feel like a freakin' luddite over here, and I know my way around a computer. I guess I just never found anything forum worthy until now :-D

- Daniel
 
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Welcome Daniel. Are you in the Army? Beaten up prostitute :-))


The only thing I can suggest is to get bigger aquariums! Those things will be overflowing in no time! You may not even need them in SD.
 
welcome!

id the beaten prostitue still is green, it should recover! :-))
 
Welcome! Glad to have you here. This is certainly a good forum to get started on. Looks like you've got a pretty good setup going on.

xvart.
 
Hey guys thanks for the comments :-D .
JLAP - Lol, nah I'm not in the army, I was just up way too early today and a little bitter about my raff. Those were the only words that came to mind to describe it :-)) Oh yea, I plan on removing the tanks and humidity domes once it cools down some and I can put the front cover of the grow rack down. I also need some more plants to increase the humidity in there(then again, don't we all?). San Diego is fairly Humid, but inside the house the humidity actually drops off some. I am experimenting with growing some Ventratas on a windowsill and outside right now to see how they will do (Before risking my other neps). I know a few people grow outside here, or at least so I've heard on this forum, but San Diego has a pretty dynamic climate in the area that it covers. I am slightly inland.

Obregon - The beaten up Pro is still green, but it's small and the growth tip is dying off (it had fibrous milky threads barely connecting it, so I left it on so it may reclaim it's nutrients if possible... This is just a theory from other plant types). Also, two of the leaves were snapped, and the snapped off part is slowly dying. The other leaves looked like they got herpes or something. Theres a few rust? spots on them and some burned parts. Luckily the plant had an extensive root structure for its small size, so hopefully it should bounce back.

Maxposwillo - Thanks bud :-D

Xvart - Sorry about the inappropriate censorship again. Thx for the hospitality, I have been reading this forum for the last month or so, and have gotten some really great ideas. Hopefully my setup will expand by another 20 or so Neps by the end of this year. Anywho, I gotta go run a few errands, but when I come back I'm gonna try to post a few more pics of some plants and the pro (raff v. E).
 
Here is my Rafflesiana V. Elongata. It is hard to say whether it is bouncing back or declining, as I got it very recently and the parts that were snapped during shipping are slowly turning brown. Hopefully this is a good sign, as it seems the plant is indeed reclaiming its nutrients from the snapped parts (as opposed to dying off fast). I could however be absolutely wrong. Let me know what you think. (Note the wilting growth tip). Poor lil' guy.

RaffVElongataBeatUp.jpg


I tried contacting the distributor via their website, but I haven't gotten around to calling them. For 20$ i really need to if this plant takes a crap on me.

BTW sorry for the distributor tag in the pic. Does this violate the no-CP Store-websites rule? I can take another pic if so. I tried not to include it, but this picture showed the status of the plant the best.
 
Here are a few more pics. The first one is of 3 baby Cephs I have. I'm sure some of you can guess where I got these. I believe they are seed grown but I'm not positive. I ordered two, but after a few months I chopped the larger of the two up and made 4 more plants out of it lol (5 total from that clump and 1 original untouched clump) . They have all rooted too, so now I'm just giving them time. None of them have any non-carnivorous leaves? I thought this was a bit strange, but maybe it is because they're so young? Anyway the second pic is a close up of one of the clumps I cut off the larger original Cephs. It seems to have grown some algae or something green on the perlite. I did some freshwater flushing in case anything was built up, but I'm thinking this is normal and a result of the splitting of the ceph. With the clump splitting came a chunk of moss that was growing in the ceph. Note on the second pic the moss is actually growing from inside the tiny ceph pitcher. I have no idea what is normal and what isn't, so occasionally I will flush to make sure any toxins are diluted/washed away, and I figured I would check around for some answers. Any comments would be appreciated. Also, does anyone know what kind of moss is growing around these cephs? I have not had live LFS before, so I'm not sure if this is it, or one of the other 10,000 moss types. It is also fairly small.

The bottom right Ceph is the untouched Clump. The top Ceph is what's left of the chopped up clump, and the one on the left is one of the rooted cuttings. The Perlite from the original Cephs is still white compared to the cutting... ? It actually seems like there is two types of mosses on the bottom right Ceph; some sort of blanket moss and a fiberous moss. Note the longer strand growing around the Ceph on the left.
3Cephs.jpg


This closeup of the cutting shows the moss growing out of the pitcher fairly well. At first I thought I was trippin, but it really is growing from inside. (2nd pitcher from the right)
MossballCeph.jpg


This is a Nepenthes I picked up the other day from a Nursery here in San Diego. So far they are the only place I have been able to find a Nep locally, that isn't some TC abomination in a plastic sarcophagus. I believe it to be N. Ventrata but correct me if I'm wrong. I actually picked up a few of these for around the house. For 15 bucks you can't go wrong. This one has a fair amount of red to it, whereas the other one has much more green.
Ventratamaybe.jpg


Here is my Rajah struggling and making me look bad. Note: It is not potted in pure bark, i used extra bark to fill up the top. I believe it is a 1/1/1 peat perlite bark mix underneath. It has grown just as slow as my cephs (received around the same time), and while my truncata and ventricosa have nearly tripled in size in the same time (also received together), the Rajah may have opened a couple leaves. San Diego is pretty hot tho...
RajahLag.jpg


Here is my Nepenthes Gymnamphora. I got it about a month ago. It came with a woody stem, and it seems like they clipped the vine because it made a basal rosette. The supplied pitcher was crushed in the mail (just like my raff yay! :-D ) but the plant seems to be doing fine. The largest pitcher on it right now is larger than the newest one, but I think that is because it is splitting its energy amongst new growth. There is actually two basals, but one is obscured by a leaf.
NepenthesGymnamphora.jpg


Here is my N. Marbled Dragon. I have had this Nep the longest, as well as my Sabre, and it is my favorite pitcher so far. That is, until I get my Hamata :boogie:
MarbledDragon906.jpg


Imma try to get some better pics of my other plants up, and maybe get rid of the bright blood red walls. This is our weight room so the red is for a good pump. The blinding hundreds of watts from the grow rack dont really help though. I think I might have to annex the room as a grow room instead. If I could do that I would get a swamp cooler for sure and grow Highlanders better. All comments and suggestions would be greatly appreciated =)
 
  • #10
Welcome to TF! What's under the covers? Unless they are acclimating to new conditions, they oughta be exposed to the air, to prevent mold and etiolation.
 
  • #11
Hey jim. Theres a couple sundews and some N.Ventricosas under there. As well as some Nep Cuttings that are being rooted. There is also some LFS in there. The tops are open-vented and they get opened a couple times a day. I haven't had a problem with mold so far. Thanks for the advice though =).
 
  • #12
Yeah, get rid of the aquariums! San Diego is coastal enough to have good humidity unless you are well inland. Just grow them on the grow rack you have!

Welcome to the forums and the crazy world of nepenthes!

Max
 
  • #13
Hey Max thx for the input :-D I do plan to get rid of the tanks but right now average humidity is around 40%. The temperature is also very hot right now, so I figured I would keep the humidity high (~85%) as I heard this helps Neps cope with hot weather. I live in the 92126 area code, which is fairly inland. I figured I would wait until it cools down some to lose the tanks. Do you think this is a good idea? I can spray the plants a few times a day, but it seems the humidity will still stay low even on the grow rack. Thx again, all input is appreciated.
 
  • #14
welcome!
 
  • #15
Hey Sehtnepen, I was going to ask if you were inland a bit. It does make a difference. Still I think only the most picky of nepenthes should need a tank in your conditions. I've found nepenthes to really like moving air and circulation. They just seem happier. Try it with one or two and see how it goes! The weather should start cooling down soon anyway.

Let us know how it goes!

Max
 
  • #16
This is a Nepenthes I picked up the other day from a Nursery here in San Diego.
Would that be Walter Anderson nursery? Because that's where I got my ventrata.
 
  • #17
Heya CNCReefer. I have seen a couple of your posts before and noticed you were in San Diego as well. I did not pick up that Nepenthes at Walter Anderson, but at Armstrong Nursery off of the 5 freeway near Sea World. I did buy one at the Poway Walter Anderson, but it did not have any pitchers on it. It is currently on my SE windowsill (I am currently trying to root some cuttings of it in one of the humidity domes). The Nepenthes pictured came with all the pitchers on it, and I had to order it from their distributor. Walter Anderson wanted 40 for a pitcherless Nep but this one as you can tell has some decent growth and was only 15. Anywho, thanks for the feedback. I would be interested in seeing your setup/growlist if at all possible. Also I would like to know the general area where you live so I can gauge my growing possibilities. Thanks again.

-Daniel
 
  • #19
Heya Ron. I was just checkin' out your growlist, and I noticed you have some nice Nep hybrids. Do you grow those outside? Which are the few that you grow inside? I live on Mira Mesa Blvd., just off of the 15. My average humidity for the last week has been around 40% during the day and around 50% at night. Have you had much success with your bicalc. in your conditions?

- Daniel

Oh ya, is there any other nurseries/stores you recommend for some CP's in the area? I noticed Walter Anderson had some Sarracenias the other day. I was considering giving one a try.
 
  • #20
Most of the hybrids grow outside. Only the bical and the maxima "barone lowland" grow inside. I have them in one of those grow rack/greenhouse thingys.
There are a couple other nep hybrids that grow in the greenhouse thingy that would probably grow better outside, but my nep growing area is too small. The bical doesn't look too good right now, maybe I shouldn't have had it by the air conditioner.
 
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