soil conditions

[naich]

what kind of soil should i use...i have heard about 40% peat moss, 40% perlite and 20% sand


what do you use heres the two species i have

Forked Sundew (Drosera dichomata)-Red Form
Cape Sundew (Drosera capensis)-White Form

there going in with pitchers and fly traps...but i have a enough room to seperate the soil conditions

 

[SDCPs]

That will work fine. Both are very hardy.

 

[w03]

Both are tough to the extreme, just put them in whatever soil the flytraps and pitchers are in.

 

[Wolfn]

Both are tough to the extreme, just put them in whatever soil the flytraps and pitchers are in.

I agree, but beware of what kind of peat moss you are using. Does the bag say "Miracle Gro" or have any fertilizer in it?

 

[naich]

i know to stay away from fertalizer...but just in case.....what brands do you use?

from lowes or home depo

 

[blokeman]

cp's will not like fertilizers, they are carnivorous because they evolved in areas where there are no nutrients in the soil. The soil is acidic and doesn't allow anything to decompose and release nutrients in the media. Ferts will damage the sensitive root systems of cp's, so basically, stay away from them. Wolfn mentionned this because some companies add ferts to their mix, so you want to make sure that your media doesn't have any in them...

 

[Wolfn]

i know to stay away from fertalizer...but just in case.....what brands do you use?

from lowes or home depo

It doesn't matter. When you buy soil, just make sure it doesn't have any fertilizers and stuff. It needs to be as pure as possible.


Personally, I bought my peat moss from Lowes. Unfortunately, they only had large bags of pure-peat moss (smaller ones had fertilizer), so I have enough peat moss to last me for years. I also like to add lots of sand to my soil, but I try to stay away from perlite. When perlite is mixed in the soil, it tends to float to the surface when the soil is wet from the rain and it's a pain to clean up. Sand is better and it looks nicer. Not to mention it's more natural (you don't exactly find perlite in the wild). Perlite is preferred by the CPs that love rockier and well-drained soils.

 

[jimscott]

Your best bet with peat is to buy the bales, like 2.5 cm. It may be overkill if you have a small collection but they don't have additives and you can use whatever you have left for other gardening projects. Personally, for a small collection and keeping things uncomplicated, I would buy a $4 bag of LFS / orchid moss.