"Normal" Ceph behavior?

[DragonsEye]

this past spring/summer I obtained a pair of rooted leaf pullings from to different members. It had been a few years since I last tried and failed so I was game to try again and hopefully not murder them. Batting average is still not great as two of them up and died on me. (Interestingly enough, one out of each pair.). On the bright side, I still have two I haven't killed. Heh

So the Ceph prompting this inquiry was from the first trade. It put up a bunch of rather cute little pitchers which pleased me as it implied I was doing something right. Recently, it opened it's newest pitcher which looks like this:





Is it normal for them to make such huge jumps in pitcher size?

Also, while I'm asking Qs, would it behoove me to drop a beta food pellet into this larger pitcher? And if "yes", should the pellet be crushed up or left whole or doesn't it matter?

 

[MEOWorksCreative]

Yes that's what cephs will do. They'll start with a small clump of immature pitchers and then suddenly throw out a huge mature one. As for feeding, I just drop whole pellets.

 

[hcarlton]

Yep, as mentioned, a sudden jump from immature to mature is typical once they guys reach the right age and health. Now that said, I wish I knew why mine kept dying every time I attempted repotting them...

 

[DragonsEye]

Now that said, I wish I knew why mine kept dying every time I attempted repotting them...

ive never had one live long enough to need repotted.

 

[fredg]

Now that said, I wish I knew why mine kept dying every time I attempted repotting them...

Now, that also, is quite "normal" behaviour.

 

[DragonsEye]

Are they really that temperamental regarding repotting, Fred?

 

[MEOWorksCreative]

I've never had trouble with my 'typical' form to be honest. Must be good genetics or something because I'll tell you, I've put that poor plant through everything when it first got here; 90F summers, constant drying out to the point the media shrank a bit, then over watering, stagnant conditions, one time I didn't replace my lights so it didn't have lighting for a good two months (yes life got a bit busy there), sudden repotting during the growth season into completely new media while also taking a lot of cuttings/divisions...this plant took it all. It's almost freakish.

PS. There's a good chance this is all purely luck, though haha

 

[fredg]

The original advice I read ( Adrian Slack) was to be very careful with re-potting and disturb the roots as little as possible, so that I have in the main followed. I have cut off pots to leave the entire root ball and compost intact and inserted that into a larger pot. This of course means that on my original plants the compost in the middle of the pot is some 30 years old. The plants don't seem to mind that.
On one occasion I did completely bare root a large plant and separate the individual plants. Those were carefully re-potted in fresh compost and I think about 70% survived. Even those survivors lost most if not all of their top growth and took some time to re-establish themselves. On that experience I returned to the complete root ball method. That way the plants don't even know anything has changed.

 

[DragonsEye]

Thanks for the info and tips, Fred!