Wire Man's Plants

[Wire Man]

N. 'Lorraine' is singalana x boschiana. Very easy and insanely dark! I didn't notice that one for a while because it was hidden under some other plants.

 

[bluemax]

The cistiflora seeds weren't as hard to germinate as I expected. The day I was going to sprinkle some ash on the pot was the day I saw the first sprout. Which flower color were your seeds?

They are/were pink, white and mauve - all separate. Yeah, ouch!

 

[Wire Man]

Mine is the red form. I should be doing a trade/giveaway deal once they're large enough.

 

[DragonsEye]

As far as Cephalotus is concerned, I find once they are happy they grow extremely fast in CP terms. In about 16 months I've had one go from a small plant in a 2" pot with no mature pitchers to completely filling a 5.5" pot. Before I found what works in my conditions it was painfully slow and nearly died haha.

Unfortunately, I have yet to get to that point ... killed two cephs thus far and have yet to gather my "courage" to try again.

 

[31drew31]

Unfortunately, I have yet to get to that point ... killed two cephs thus far and have yet to gather my "courage" to try again.

For me, the traditional peat mixes weren't working. I then decided to try 50/50 LF/perlite and they took off.

 

[corky]

love the dark lorraine,your plants are looking very happy indeed

 

[Wire Man]

I love that coloration, too. It just opened a new one, so we'll see what it does. The previous one developed that coloration while shaded, which I find really weird.

And in other news, I have attenboroughii germination!!!! I have to give a big thanks to Luca for suggesting the use of bottom heat. That seems to have done the trick.

 

[richjam1986]

Congrats on the germination!

 

[Wire Man]

Thanks! Here's a pic of the germinating seed.

N. attenboroughii Germination by Wire Man, on Flickr

You may want to view that in full.

 

[corky]

wireman you say you think its strange that your lorraine developed good colour in the shade,some time back there was a thread on this on the pitcher plants in the tropics forum and this does happen,someone had a plant that buried pitchers in moss and they coloured up better than pitchers in full sun,weird indeedy

 

[Wire Man]

I actually had an idea on why they do that last year. The dark coloration and tendency to work the tendrils into shaded spots might be an adaptation to prevent algae growth inside of the pitcher. All of the dissolved nutrients inside of the pitcher would cause an algae bloom if exposed to enough light. This actually happened to one of mine once. Said algae would rob the plant of its carefully acquired nutrition. The upper pitchers probably have something in the fluid that prevents algae from growing.

I should have been a bio major.

 

[Wire Man]

First update for 2013!

Cephalotus, dripping with nectar.

Cephalotus by Wire Man, on Flickr

D. palaecea ssp. trichocaulis

D. palaecea ssp. trichocaulis by Wire Man, on Flickr

I was excited for this Paph bloom, but I came back to this.....

Broken Bloom by Wire Man, on Flickr

H. minor is happy.

H. minor by Wire Man, on Flickr

D. occidentalis

D. occidentalis by Wire Man, on Flickr

Cephalotus by Wire Man, on Flickr

D. madagascariensis

D. madagascariensis by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. burkei with a rather slender pitcher. The next one should be exciting.

N. burkei by Wire Man, on Flickr

Little N. attenboroughii seedlings!

N. attenboroughii Sprouts by Wire Man, on Flickr

D. occidentalis flower with a missing petal

D. occidentails by Wire Man, on Flickr

 

[That One Guy]

Awesome ceph.

What happened to your Paph flower?

 

[Wire Man]

That thing is quickly becoming one of my favorite plants. It's in dormancy now, but it still looks good.

The Paph flower was broken by my plant sitter. I have no clue what she was doing that broke it.

 

[Wire Man]

N. naga is already showing signs of the forked appendage at seedling size!

N. naga by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. 'Dormouse' new pitcher.

N. 'Dormouse' by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. lavicola

N. lavicola by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. naga, again

N. naga by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. 'Dormouse' a few days later

N. 'Dormouse' by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. boschiana

N. boschiana by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. 'Lorraine', largest pitcher so far.

N. 'Lorraine' by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. 'Caladium'

N. 'Caladium' by Wire Man, on Flickr

N. 'Caladium' by Wire Man, on Flickr

 

[bluemax]

N. 'Caladium' certainly has handsome pitchers. Are you now growing under leds? Your lighting looks distinctly reddish.

 

[Wire Man]

They're under 2 t12 tubes now. I moved them all from the dink 10 gallon to the much more spacious 55 gallon. One of the tubes has a blue hue, which the other is more red, so that would explain why they have a slightly different color to them. Once I upgrade the fixture and suspend it from the ceiling I'll get 2 daylight spectrum tubes to even things out.

 

[Wire Man]

New video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OQw04cF4sE&list=UUQ7kyI9GHOu6BMf_YUguc5w&index=1

 

[Sundrew]

The cistiflora look amazing! Good job Graham.

 

[Wire Man]

Thanks, it's chugging along at a good speed. I'm hoping it'll hit a growth spurt and build up the tuber before summer.