Drosera schizandra cultivation/propagation questions

[stormbringer]

Hello,
Thankfully, my quest for this plant is nearing its end...I'm expecting to receive one within the next few days!

I know that this plant likes low light levels and high humidity, but are there any other considerations I should be aware of? Also, does this plant grow relatively fast? I've heard that it can take a very long time to propagate D. schizandra by standard root/leaf cutting methods, is there any way to accelerate the process? Thanks,
Nile

 

[RL7836]

Hello,
Thankfully, my quest for this plant is nearing its end...I'm expecting to receive one within the next few days!

I know that this plant likes low light levels and high humidity, but are there any other considerations I should be aware of? Also, does this plant grow relatively fast? I've heard that it can take a very long time to propagate D. schizandra by standard root/leaf cutting methods, is there any way to accelerate the process? Thanks,
Nile

Nile,
Good luck w/ your plant.

Here are some threads w/ info on my & other's experiences growing these guys:
Schizandra 1 Schizandra 2

I've heard that it can take a very long time to propagate D. schizandra by standard root/leaf cutting methods, is there any way to accelerate the process?

I'm not too sure where you heard this... While I was initially skeptical of Lowrie's assertion (in vol 3) that these plants were easy to propagate via leaf cuttings, I figured I'd give it a shot. My initial group of plantlets came from volunteers from surface roots or from older leaves that were decaying under the newer ones on my 'mother' plant. Here is a pic of plantlets forming on 2 smaller leaves on 04.01.07:

Here's a pic of the same plantlets on 05.08.07:

They have continued growing well and are larger today, starting to get fairly crowded in their small container. They are growing on a thin bed of moist live LFS in a closed clear plastic container kept in a north-facing window. I placed the 2 leaves on the LFS and spread a few small pieces of LFS on top of the leaves to ensure they stayed moist (but not enough to obscure the light). I don't have the date I originally placed the leaves in the container immediately available (sorry) but IIRC, it was sometime in March.

BTW - little to none of this info is originally mine (ie: discovered by me). It's all out there in the forum's old posts (& some from SundewMatt's Yahoo Sundew group archives). I love the amount of valuable info growers share in these forums!

I hope this helps. Good luck again.

 

[crappyclay]

your plants are really pretty... i've never had luck with them...
good luck with all the little plantlets that you have...!

 

[Clint]

What are your day/night temps?

 

[Jefforever]

Man, these things grow so slow!!!!!!

 

[stormbringer]

Thanks for the info, its certainly encouraging...it looks like your plantlets are doing really well!

 

[LLeopardGGecko]

I tried growing this species once and it didn't do well for me. Next time I try this plant I think I'll keep it in a covered fishbowl terrarium on a north-facing windowsill, since I believe that high light levels and low humidity were my little guy's downfall.

 

[RL7836]

What are your day/night temps?

These guys grow well for me all winter. The daytime temps come up to 70-72*F typically and nighttime is probably in the low to mid 60's*F.

Since we let the summer temps get much higher (minimal A/C), these plants get very unhappy (bleached & smaller leaves, slower growth, etc). This year, I am trying to over-summer them under lights in a basement tank. They were relocated about a month ago and so far, things are going well....

 

[The Griffin]

I promise you, Ron, your plants will love the basement.

Cheers,

Joe

 

[mass]

Sorry to bump and old thread.. but I've got a question.
My success with schizandra propagation has brought me to the point pictured. But now I'm starting to lose the larger plantlets. They are just fading away like the original leaf cutting. Am I missing something to keep them going? Like required feeding?

 

[jesse]

Sorry to bump and old thread.. but I've got a question.
My success with schizandra propagation has brought me to the point pictured. But now I'm starting to lose the larger plantlets. They are just fading away like the original leaf cutting. Am I missing something to keep them going? Like required feeding?

Considering that things went fine at first and now go wrong, along with the current season: What about the temperatures? Is the temperature lower now than before?

Or maybe fungus gnat larvae in the substrate?

 

[mass]

Considering that things went fine at first and now go wrong, along with the current season: What about the temperatures? Is the temperature lower now than before?

Or maybe fungus gnat larvae in the substrate?

Conditions are the same year round.

I'll have to give a look see for pests though.

 

[31drew31]

I dont have experience with shizandra, but with prolifera, after the parent leaf starts rotting away I need to feed the plants or they start to slowly get smaller. When being fed they grow quite steadily.

 

[mass]

I dont have experience with shizandra, but with prolifera, after the parent leaf starts rotting away I need to feed the plants or they start to slowly get smaller. When being fed they grow quite steadily.

They've been fed, so that's not it either.

 

[RL7836]

I dont have experience with shizandra, but with prolifera ...

IME, the size of each of the three sister's comfort zones decreases from adelae to prolifera to schizandra. All are weeds when they sit in the middle of their zone but each can be unhappy when moved outside it. The comfort zone for schizandra is quite small & unlike Neps which usually take some time to die, schizzies can go fairly quickly.

Sorry to bump and old thread.. but I've got a question.
My success with schizandra propagation has brought me to the point pictured. But now I'm starting to lose the larger plantlets. They are just fading away like the original leaf cutting. Am I missing something to keep them going? Like required feeding?

Travis,
I suspect that you'll have to play with your conditions - tweaking things. I usually found that the wet conditions that work well for propagation need to be somewhat drier for growing the plants past the stage in the pic. Finding those exact conditions was usually a work-in-progress for me. I typically tried a few different containers / environments and transplanted the babies when quite young. When I found some that worked well, I would place more babies in that container. The older the plants got, the more robust they tended to be.

In addition, watch your temps. while it's pretty obvious that my summer temps stressed the plants, I also found that they can get pretty unhappy in the cooler HL temps that many Neps love in my winter basement.

As mentioned, feeding can help speed up growth but the inevitable mold (for me) caused problems. Everything I used caused mold & the mold melted the leaf underneath. To keep this from happening, I normally used 70% ipa and wiped the section of leaf clean where the food lay after ~3-5 days - just before mold formation but after the plant got most of the nutrients. Without feeding all of the plants I raised tended to max out around 4 inches diameter (and many never got that big) and never flowered. With feeding, plants flowered and got up to ~7" (with this size being constrained by the glass dome I used). I'd really like to try a larger container and see how big they can get in my conditions. The large flowering plant that I had was probably the most impressive dew I've ever seen - so large, so much amazing dew and then topped with the brilliantly-colored flowers with the split anthers. It was tough to not be drawn to it - a really wonderful reward for all the effort...