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Coffeed Nepenthes Update

Here is an update on some of my coffee fed Nepenthes. These plants were purchased from CZ Plants in May of 2008. They were all potted up into five inch diameter plastic pots, and were initially grown together in a 16" x 8.25" terrarium. Once the N. rajah outgrew the terrarium it was moved into a terra of its own.

Just to show a progression of these plant's growth since February 2009 up until today, here are some previous shots.

From February 5, 2009. From left to right, N. macrophylla, N. villosa, N. rajah.
IMG_0591-1.jpg


May 2, 2009
IMG_1125-1.jpg


August 3, 2009 The rajah was moved out and replaced with a smaller villosa in this pic.
IMG_1606-1.jpg


Today I decided to squeeze the rajah back into the terra with the original villosa and macrophylla, just to show how the plants have grown since the last update. All of these plants have been given two or three coffee feedings since I first began the coffee treatments in Feb, 2009.

Today, April 16, 2010 From left to right, N. villosa, N. rajah, N. macrophylla.
IMG_2879-1.jpg


And because the rajah covered up some of the villosa and macrophylla in the terra shot, here are the plants spread out together on our sidewalk. Left to right, N. macrophylla, N. rajah, N. villosa.
IMG_2888-1.jpg


Although a commercial fertilizing program might very well have sped up the growth of these plants, i am happy with their overall health, and general appearance. Coffee does seem to be quite safe for use as a starter fertilizer. And it looks like I'll be repotting these plants in the next couple months or so.

dvg
 
those results are amazing
 
What A huge difference wow! Boy I want a Villosa or macro....

DVG, that rajah is perhaps the most impressive, great results on that and a few pitchers coming! That Villosa has grown exponentially, looks like it's not living to it's reputation ;)
 
i just made a shopping list, and its only got one item on it. Coffee.
 
awesome results, think im going to give this a try now
 
Beautiful, as always. I too have joined the java cult and am seeing some progress . . .
 
I tried the coffee treatment and it certainly didn't hurt, but I didn't see huge results either. But seems like you've had some impressive results DVG!
 
Ummmm. Time to look for that coffee tratment thread. Lol. Looking great, keep up the great work! :)
 
Brewing a pot as i type.
 
  • #10
Oh man, imagine if you used coffee to supplement a commericial feeding program?

Those are wicked results man, considering N. Villosa is deathly slow.
 
  • #11
Is anyone keeping track of the amounts, concentration and frequency at which you are applying the coffee? This can vary your results as much as any fertilizer.

I am wondering if different people are sticking to one "specific method" of these variables, or if some people are just making a pot of coffee and giving the plant a cup!? (I would like to know what people have decided is the "ideal dose". Oh yea, decaf or regular?

I once worked with a woman years ago who only watered the plant on her desk with her left over coffee. I inherited it when she finally nearly killed it. (Yea, too much of anything can be a bad thing.) In this case the plant was a nice velvety gloxinia. The first time I watered it with fresh water, nearly black "coffee" came out of the bottom!

I just am throwing that out there, so people remember that even though it is just coffee, it can still be overdone.

Keep in mind, coffee or fertilizer won't make up for sub-standard growing conditions. In fact, the right conditions are needed in order for the plant to make use of the available nutrients.

Nice lookin' plants here! Can't argue with success!
 
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  • #12
Awesome results dvg. I've had a macro since your first pic, and wow yours has put on a tremendous amount of size in that time compared to mine. So, what's your routine?
 
  • #13
Thanks for the kind words guys,

If any of you want to do any further reading on coffee feeding, here are some of the links that got me started on coffeed Neps:

I first learned about the coffee feeding idea from this thread:

http://pitcherplants.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=6288

Here are a couple of more links dealing with this same topic:

http://lhnn.proboards.com/index.cgi?boa ... hread=2366

http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~dpevans/Nepenthes/N_rajah.htm

Nightsky, I feed all of my Neps coffee about once every six months or so. And my macrophyllas are given typical highland conditions, although the one in question is kept cooler at night because it is in with the villosa, and probably grows slower than the other N. macs as a consequence.

And although i have had a bit of success with coffee feeding, i am going to begin soil feeding my Neps with low urea commercial fertilizers.

dvg
 
  • #14
I must agree that this is single-handedly the best demonstration for promoting coffee use. Ideally, it would be amazing if there were some control plants grown beside these to actually show size differences. But either way...those are some immaculate picture-perfect specimens grown in probably the best ideal conditions a nep can want. Spectacular job!
 
  • #15
Thanks for posting the links.
I am interested to see if it has any effects beyond simply supplying fertilizer components to an otherwise unfertilized plant.
Back in the 80's or earlier (can't remember, as I'm growin' old!), people were using coffee as a fertilizer replacement (if they didn't have fertilizer on hand) for plants of every kind, as I remember from my "organic gardening" days.

I am glad people are finally accepting that it is at least somewhat "okay" to fertilize CP's of various kinds. Something a bunch of us did way back when, even though we weren't "supposed to"!
Keep in mind that even many of today's hard fast "facts", could be disproved in the future!
 
  • #16
Thanks for posting the links.
I am interested to see if it has any effects beyond simply supplying fertilizer components to an otherwise unfertilized plant.
Back in the 80's or earlier (can't remember, as I'm growin' old!), people were using coffee as a fertilizer replacement (if they didn't have fertilizer on hand) for plants of every kind, as I remember from my "organic gardening" days.

I am glad people are finally accepting that it is at least somewhat "okay" to fertilize CP's of various kinds. Something a bunch of us did way back when, even though we weren't "supposed to"!
Keep in mind that even many of today's hard fast "facts", could be disproved in the future!

I actually grew no feed last year, this year I've been feeding and the plants have been going bananas. No algae or slime to report either. It even brought my LFS back to life!

The reason people are so against promoting the idea of feeding is because it does not make up for errors in cultivation. Thats what Jacob told me and his nursery secretly uses 1/4 str orchid fertilizer in the spring!

For a lot of people, they don't need the added growth though and are running out of room. I use feed as a substitute for insects because they make the pitcher fluid all gross and thick and the pitchers tend to last longer. Well the top half at least.
 
  • #17
I must agree that this is single-handedly the best demonstration for promoting coffee use. Ideally, it would be amazing if there were some control plants grown beside these to actually show size differences. But either way...those are some immaculate picture-perfect specimens grown in probably the best ideal conditions a nep can want. Spectacular job!

Thanks vraev.

It'll be interesting to see how the plants respond to a more conventional fertilizing regimen, in the coming months.

dvg
 
  • #18
Good luck with it. I have always read a lot about things like maxsea fertilizer and so on. I just never wanted the additional pain of loosing plants due to too high strength fertilizer or improperly flushing out salts from the previous fertilization. The only two things I have tried are coffee (which I must say you are responsible for making it popular) and a non-urea orchid fert. Early on when I tried that fert on my older N. rajah...it stalled it and the plant never recovered. I was sick of waiting for it to grow and tossed it. However, one time and only one time... I made a dilution of the exisiting old batch in the sprayer arbitrarily and sprayed it on my lowii plantlets. Those things came alive. There is still a lot of sheet moss growth, but the lowii thrived on it. However, now I just cannot recreate that dilution. Ironic that I am doing research eh? :p I guess just like I make protocols and record what I do with mice, I got to record my fertilization attempts as well.
 
  • #19
Vraev, I use 2tsp on all my plants now. The recommended dose, as everyone knows is 1tsp. I've used it at 1tbsp (3tsp) right off the bat which is the full dosage on my Veitchii x Platychila which was tiny at the time and it's grown stupid huge. This was it 2 weeks after I started feeding:
http://imgur.com/1o667.jpg
The plant now is really huge, but I lost my phone so uhh... I'll get back to anybody who wants to see.

I can tell you that JensB on the pitcher pro boards uses 1tb all the time on all his plants including helis, cephs, and some of the rarer neps including Hamata with no penalties, the guy doesn't even flush.

For the 2 months I've been using Maxsea now, I've seen no leaf curl or tip burning as expected when you stall them. I only water my plants twice a week (60 percent LFS mix) and my plants are looking great.

I think coffee has a lot of trace minerals and micro nutrients to amend a lot of the deficiencies in our Nep media so it really helps the little guys along and thats why it lasts for the 3-6 months that it does. I'm not going to drop my current feeding regimen because it works for me, but I will supplement it with coffee pours every 4 months now. The thing I'm afraid of most is the smell and the residue it'll leave in my plant trays.

Thanks for posting this thread! Your plants are really photogenic! Mine look like crap from winter as it only started getting warm in my area last week!
 
  • #20
I treated my Neps with coffee a month ago and the two that seemed to benifit the most are my burbidgeae, which has begun to pitcher and grow faster, and my ovata, which hadn't pitchered since last summer but has now opened one the size of my fist.

I think the coffee does help, especially with plants that don't have pitchers to catch prey with.
 
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