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My first Mature Cephalotus Pitchers!

Hey everyone,
My Cephalotus finally sent out its first mature pitchers last month and I finally have time to upload them now.
Cephalotus_mature_pitcher.JPG


Details:
It has taken a little less than 2 years now from a leaf cutting I received (that had a small bud on it). This poor thing has suffered so much abuse- I transplanted it 2 times because the media was drying out too much, etc... but it never died off, which is amazing to me. I literally haven't touched this pot for over a year (the last time I fed it), and it just keeps slowly growing.

They are watered via the tray method. The pot is about 7 inches tall (an old blank CD rack cover) and I'm using the Charles Brewer Ceph mix:
45% dried spagnum moss
45% medium perlite
8% peat/sand mixture
2% wood charcoal
More sand/peat can be added and doesn't cause problems.
http://www.aqph26.dsl.pipex.com/cephalotusfollil.html

My mom fills up the tray once a week or so while I'm away at school for up to 2 months at a time. She's the best :) Keep in mind, my mom has very little knowledge about carnivorous plants, so this shows that anyone can grow a ceph if they put it in a good mix and make sure it doesn't ever dry out ;)


Here's a picture of the whole pot (surrounded by the 3 sisters of Queensland, one of which is on life support:
Cephalotus_pot_med.JPG


The young pitchers look pretty crappy but I'm impressed at how beatiful the adult pitcher looks. I fed it some Beta pellets now, so hopefully it will put out a few more pitchers in the near future.
 
Nice! I can't keep my ceph on the tray method because the mix it came in is too dense (mostly coarse sand and some peat) so I have to top water a few times a week.
 
Congratulations.

And holy bajesus, that pot is a gold mine!
 
iam surprised that you are growing all three of the queensland dews together. usually the shizandra needs less light. this just makes me want the other two. nice pics.
adam
 
congrats Aaron! I hope mine will put out mature pitcher soon! doubt it though.. haha beautiful ceph pot too! I love those drosera and the colour is amazing as usual!!
 
wow. that's one fantastic picture... Hopefully my ceph. leaf cutting will stick and ill have something like that! looks really nice. What is your lighting conditions? (I am very impress with the pic!)
 
you're mom is super awesome! it'd be nice if my parents could do the same...neglection while i was at school was how i lost my entire collection 4 years ago.
 
aaddaam- I think the safe way to grow D. schizandra is under very little light, but until this picture was taken, the Schizandra had been buried under sphagnum. Now that it's popped up above the surface, it has turned pink and appears to be declining. However, the sphagnum under it has dried out, so this could be another reason. I'm going to try add in some more live sphagnum and see if it produces dew again.

Devon- thanks :) Good luck with your baby Ceph. The key is definitely to feed each pitcher. I'm guessing you already have been doing this, but WildBill from this forum has amazing Cephs and he's actually the one who got me started using Betta Bites fish food pellets. He said he dropped a pellet in each pitcher and they put out adult pitchers much faster. I just haven't been around home long enough in the past year to do that...

Jag- i appreciate the comment. I have it under 2 4-foot T-12 bulbs along with the rest of my sundews in the basement right now, which is a bit cooler than the upper part of the house. The bulbs are only about 6 inches away. In the winter, it's only around 68F in the day and a little less at night. In the summer it can get up to 80F. I heard Cephs don't like higher temps, but I don't think it's too much of an issue as long as it doesn't dry out.

amphirion- yea, my mom definitely is awesome! :D Sorry to hear about the loss of your collection...that would be devastating! Looks like you've got some nice plants now. I actually rigged up an automatic watering system for the tray method using a 2-liter pop bottle for my things at school. I'm trying it for the first time during this break, so we'll see if everything isn't dead in the greenhouse when i get back to school. Basically, it uses that physics technique that I don't know the name of----when you flip a filled bottle of water upside-down in a tub of water and the air pressure holds onto the column of water until the water level in the tray drops below the mouth of the bottle.
Beautiful avatar pic, by the way!
 
Update- looked at the Ceph this morning while watering and realized it had nectar of some sort on the teeth of the pitcher. I didn't know they could do that...pretty neat
Cephalotus_nectar.JPG
 
  • #10
wow! thanks for the tip! So I can feed the immature pitcher fish pellets? I was thinking of doing that but I was afraid they would rot or something. And that's a ton of nectar!!! I didn't know they could do that either!!
 
  • #11
Yes you can! I actually found the old message saved in one of my Terraforum pm "archive" folders:

Quote from WildBill 6-08-2008 (hope he doesn't mind ;) ): "The baby and smaller ceph pitchers get a Beta fish food called BetaBioGold. It's nearly perfect little 1/16th inch diameter spheres. It really helps, otherwise it seems like it takes FOREVER for them to grow. You see a growth spurt about a month later. The larger pitchers get Hikari brand Cichlid Staple tropical fish food pellets. It could probably be any brand but I was trying to find one that seemed to have better ingredients. I would feed one, maybe two fish food pellets in a trap every week or every two weeks. Some of the guys in the NECPS were talking about actually giving a very weak orchid fertilizer solution with an eyedropper right into the traps!"

He's also the one who recommended neem oil to me, so he pretty much changed my life.... at least in terms of cp cultivation :D
 
  • #12
sweet! Thanks! you know what I'll be doing today then!
 
  • #13
WOW that picture is gorgeous, love your Ceph!
 
  • #14
That pot is dazzling !!!
 
  • #15
also I forgot to ask, what are all those drosera? I think I see an adelae and a prolifera... that's all I can identify. :p
 
  • #16
The other dew is the declining D. schizandra towards the left side of the Ceph.
and thanks for the comments thez and indigo.
 
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