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Sarr seeding help

lance

Class 5 Nepenthes hoarder
Hi everyone
I was wondering what your seed setups for sarracenia seeds are and what would be best for my seeds. Currently, I have a 5 foot crate that I built with lights 3 feet from the bottom and a cooling fan for the lights in a separate compartment above. Is 3 feet too close to the seeds? I have the lights running for 14 hours a day and the max heat gets to about 80 degrees ( the seeds have a cover for high humidity). I would like to know what to do best or what to fix in advanced before the seed pod pops open.
Any help appreciated!

Lance
 
If you can find a way to move the lights closer when they are younger and move them higher as the plants get taller it might help things. For Sarracenia seedlings I have not had a problem with them over heating under lights. I am regularly in the 90F range and then some. But I have not kept them enclosed under lights so in that case they might get warmer and all. Might want to set up and do a dry run just potting media that you plant to use. probe type thermometers... What sort of lights are you planning to use. I have had decent results with T12 . Getting better results with T5. still testing things....
 
All I know about the lights I have is that they are broad spectrum and 2 of them are in a 4 foot cage. I wouldn't worry about moving the lights as it gets quite bright from where they are at. What do you mean by dry run? Just keep em moist without putting cover on?
 
set every thing up minus the seeds. Add water cover and see how hot everything gets
 
Thanks for the help I will try that as soon as I get home.
Anyone else have any Sarr seed setup tricks that I should also try?
 
Meadow's seedling setup has 4 light about 6" away from the top of the soil. Sarracenia can handle some absurdly high temperatures, so no worry about over heating until the leaves start getting close to touching the lights.
 
the only problems I have had was with high heat and 100% humidity. start to slowly boil them
 
They can tolerate fairly low humidity. Their sweet spot seems to be at 60% humidity and 80 degrees F.

Once they put on some size put a single pellet of ozmocote by the base of each seedling until the pellet runs clear. It really gives them an extra boost and dramatically increases their size.
 
Steve (Bugweed) Millar says soil temperatures of 80-81°F is optimal for Sarracenia seedlings.
 
  • #10
I'm no expert at growing Sarrs by seed but here's my $.02. I recently sowed another round of seeds. Did two flats, each one having ~32 2.5" pots (One type of hybrid seed per pot). I've been having good luck w/ the following setup:

Hydorfarm's or Contractor Lighting's T5 4FT 4 tube fixture (Both have been solid performers for me)
Heating mat w/ digital temp control set to 80F (noticed quicker germination and faster growth rates w/ the pad)
50/50 peat/perlite mix
I run my lights 24/7 (18hrs is likely fine though) for ~two years depending on when they were sown, then I let them have their first sleep.

Flats are not enclosed, just on a shelf either in my garage or in the house. Lights are pretty close to the media surface, maybe 4"-6". I keep the water level in the flats pretty high. I have not tried using any Osmocote at this stage, usually wait until their first repotting. They seem to respond well to fresh soil so I tend to repot ~2x/year. Good results w/ Osmocote. Track down the article on fertilizing Sarrs in the ICPS journal, think it was in 2009.

There are some here w/ far more experience, like Fred et al., so hopefully you'll hear from them.

Sticky w/ some useful info if you've not read it:
http://www.terraforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=107339
 
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