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Feed your sundews- incredibly fast growth and flowers (DUW)

As a response to Crissytal's thread, here are some pics which show how fast sundews can grow when fed. I grow these indoors in the winter, so normally they don't catch anything on their own.

First off, here is a link to a page I made documenting the growth of D. dielsiana over 2 months:
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/feeding_natalensis.html

And now for some before-and-after picures
Capensis 'Albino' and 'Red' root cuttings when fed (granted they're fast growers already)
capensisrootcuttings-2.jpg


20 days later-
DSC00967-2.jpg



D. venusta from root cuttings were slow, but took off like crazy when fed-
4 months old from root cuttings-
venustacuttings1-7-09-2.jpg


2.5 months later- they're forming flower stalks (which I cut)
ab7741b3.jpg


Continued below...
 
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The leaves of D. regia 'Big Easy' curl up into a tight ball when fed-
regia_bigeasy_eat-2.jpg

I just got this plant so it only has a few leaves.

D. aliciae- the lighter coloration is the sign of new growth. Once the leaves sit out for a long time, they develop their red coloration.
DSC01056-2.jpg



D. admirabilis a day after feeding-
DSC00860.jpg


and exactly 1 month later it is flowering and forming another flower stalk (which I'm gonna cut)
I never could get this plant to flower until after I started feeding it.
DSC01044-2.jpg
 
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D. nidiformis grows extremely fast when fed-
after transplanting since they had root rot in the perlite:peat mix I was using/ poor lighting-
DSC00213-3.jpg


2 months later-
DSC01060-2.jpg



and finally,
D. binata var. dichotoma "Giant"- looked like this for months, with 1 leaf forming every month
DSC00628-1.jpg


1.5 months later, it's developed 3 larger leaves and should start to take off now once I feed it again.
DSC01055-2.jpg
 
VERY nice! Incredible dews you have, especially the South African ones. Interesting, I need to start feeding my plants.
 
Awesome! I should start feeding my plants more often. I gave my D. adelae an ant and it burned the leaf where I put it.
 
I've been telling you people to feed your plants for the longest time. The same is true for Dionaea and Pinguicula. They grow faster, flower sooner and more often when feed.

Feed 'em what ever insects you want - ants, flightless fruit flies, insect powder (as Joseph), powdered bloodworm, fish food flakes, freeze dried flies etc. Just skip the hamburger and pizza.
 
Very nice CPlantaholic!! You have some very beautiful plants. Thank you for sharing your pictures with us. I'm hoping a consistent feeding schedule will help get my D. regia growing. I'm jealous of yours :). I'm also hoping to get some first blooms on some dews I've had for awhile.

Are the dews able to completely digest the betta pellets within a two week period?

Thanks again!
Crystal
 
Thanks for the comments everyone

Awesome! I should start feeding my plants more often. I gave my D. adelae an ant and it burned the leaf where I put it.
Yeah, for some plants you have to feed them extremely small samples of food to avoid burning the leaves. Once they get bigger, they can typically eat much larger portions of food with no burn.

I've been telling you people to feed your plants for the longest time. The same is true for Dionaea and Pinguicula. They grow faster, flower sooner and more often when feed.
Lol, NaN. I don't know how I missed that when I first started growing. It's painfully boring at times growing sundews from seed without feeding them. I did hear you mention about feeding seedlings a while back, and boy does that make a difference.

Nice plants! What exactly do you feed them?
I use Beta Fish food pellets. The ingredients sound like health food, but they work extremely well. Not only are they cheap, but you can buy pellets that are small enough that you don't have to crush them up at all. They also give you a ton in a bottle, so it lasts a really long time.
Seems like everyone recommends using dried bloodworms from pet shops, but I think this works just fine.

Very nice CPlantaholic!! You have some very beautiful plants. Thank you for sharing your pictures with us. I'm hoping a consistent feeding schedule will help get my D. regia growing. I'm jealous of yours :). I'm also hoping to get some first blooms on some dews I've had for awhile.

Are the dews able to completely digest the betta pellets within a two week period?
Crystal
Thank you for the compliments. Yeah, you should have blooms on your Admirabilis in no time.
The regia has put out 3 leaves since that picture I took 2 weeks ago. The first one (right after feeding) was 6 inches long. The next 2 were only 4.5 inches tall. It really seems to get a boost right after feeding.

The plants actually digest the pellets in a little more than a week. Then they throw out new leaves and I wait a little while to let them color-up. I need some T-5s to keep up with the growth! :p I may have to increase the photoperiod. My lights are on 16 hours a day already, though.
 
  • #10
Looking good! I use the freezedried bloodworms since I can break them up to tiny specks if needed, or apply one or more larger pieces where applicable. It's amazing how fast they sense them on the tentacles and respond.

On your lights, if you are thinking of increasing photoperiod to make up for less than ideal intensity.. it doesn't work like that. What kind of lights are you using now? The color looks pretty good on your plants.
 
  • #11
You've got a good point.

What do you feed them?
 
  • #12
On your lights, if you are thinking of increasing photoperiod to make up for less than ideal intensity.. it doesn't work like that. What kind of lights are you using now? The color looks pretty good on your plants.

Oh, well in that case, I'll leave it at 16 hours, lol :) Yeah, the coloration eventually develops, but I wait for the plant to color up like that before I feed it again. Otherwise they get extremely green due to the rapid growth from feeding.Would it be bad for my plants if I increased the photoperiod? What exactly is the process that goes on there? I use T-8s I'm pretty impressed with them so far.


You've got a good point.
What do you feed them?


I feed them Beta Fish Food pellets. They're cheap, effective, and come with about one million pellets per bottle. I don't think I'll need to buy more for a few years.
 
  • #13
On your lights, if you are thinking of increasing photoperiod to make up for less than ideal intensity.. it doesn't work like that.
A quick & easy way to increase intensity is to move the plant closer to the light source. Yes - this is rather a "Duh" observation since everyone knows it & it's just logical. However, while most people understand the concept, they don't necessarily realize that light intensity varies exponentially with distance. Specifically, intensity varies as 1/(r)(r) (aka: one over r squared) where distance = r. This means that a relatively small change in distance (r) produces a significant change in intensity.

As a quick example - if you cut the distance in half, light intensity doesn't just double, it goes up by a factor of 4. If you cut the distance by 50% again, the new intensity is 16 times the original intensity.

Obviously, as you place plants closer to your lights, heat becomes more of an issue. However, this is also true if you purchase a new, stronger light fixture ....:nono:
 
  • #14
I like the documentation of before and after. I noticed a huge explosion in growth in both my dews and pings when I started feeding them freeze dried bloodworms.
 
  • #15
I like the documentation of before and after. I noticed a huge explosion in growth in both my dews and pings when I started feeding them freeze dried bloodworms.

As per intsructions (Joseph Clemens), pulverize the food, sprinkle, and spray water on the leaves.
 
  • #16
Thanks.
Ron, now that you mention it, I think I have an inch leeway with this setup I'm using, so I may try it. Most of the dews are 3 inches away from the lights- except the tall ones like the Capes and D. regia. It's just those darned flower stalks that keep burning up on me!
I can't really figure out the math on that one, but it should be a bit less than 4x the light intensity (9/4?).
 
  • #17
does this mean if you feed your vfts, they wont lose as much energy during flowering, or different concept?

in my avatar, you can see some fish food. xP
 
  • #18
That is correct. I have to relate it to sundews, but my D. venusta coccicaulis typically produces very small leaves when flowering as it is using up a lot of energy to produce a 1 foot flowerstalk. When fed, the leaves only shrink slightly, and after it finishes flowering, it immediately produces massive leaves again. Same goes for any sundew.
 
  • #19
Does anyone here spritz the leaves after feeding or do you leave all of the digesting and stimulation up to the plants?
 
  • #20
I actually don't do anything special. I just give them the dry pellets and the dew soaks it up and then turns it to a goo, which it then absorbs. Nothing is left after it gets done eating.
 
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