Just finished up finals Friday, so I finally found a bit of time to post this...
After waiting a year for my D. graomogolensis to size up, I’m finally able to report success with leaf cuttings. This has been done before by several others before, but I'm the only one so far who has had nothing better to do than to document the entire process, so I hope you enjoy the pictures I’ve taken over the course of the last 3 months:
This is (backside of) the leaf that I will be documenting:
2/21/10
It was one of the newest leaves on the plant when I cut it off
This leaf cutting trial also ended up testing how much heat the leaf cuttings can handle.
In the place I lived, there were no controls for the heat, so combined with the heat from the fixture I used (with really crappy bulbs) the temps were around 85-90 F most of the time. Once the lights shut off, the room temp was still around 75-80 degrees F. Somehow, the leaves didn’t decay at all…
After about a month and a half, I finally saw the first growth!
4/2/10
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/graomogolensis/leaf_cuttings/4-2-10.JPG
4/16/10
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/...tings/Drosera_graomogolensis_leaf_cutting.JPG
At this point, I finally found some free time to pot them up in waterlogged NZ long-fibered sphagnum.
I put the cuttings under a fixture with better (cooler) bulbs and this is what they looked like after 1 week:
4/23/10
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/...osera_graomogolensis_leaf_cutting_planted.JPG
5/7/10
very large file: http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/graomogolensis/leaf_cuttings/Grao_leaf_cutting_5-7-10_hi-res.JPG
View of the other side:
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/...lensis_leaf_cutting_backside-5-7-10_large.JPG
The best part about this process was that the mother plant was able to recover in only 2 months. This picture was taken 4/24/10, and you can’t even tell that I took 5 leaf cuttings!
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/graomogolensis/large_D_Graomogolensis_4-24-10.JPG
Just to show you how fast of a grower D. graomogolensis is, the picture above was taken one year and one month after this picture (for reference, the plant in the picture below is about 2 times the size of the leaf cutting plantlets):
So if all goes well, I should have a few more plants to spread around in a year or 2.
As you’ve seen, the newest leaves produce a ton of plantlets (actually too many to the point they’re going to choke each other out). Also, even some of the older leaves were able to produce 4-5 plantlets per leaf, but definitely not as many as the newest ones.
Big thanks to Crystal for letting me know this was possible!!!!!! Otherwise, I doubt I would have tried this for another half-year (I am very protective over my plants lol).
After waiting a year for my D. graomogolensis to size up, I’m finally able to report success with leaf cuttings. This has been done before by several others before, but I'm the only one so far who has had nothing better to do than to document the entire process, so I hope you enjoy the pictures I’ve taken over the course of the last 3 months:
This is (backside of) the leaf that I will be documenting:
2/21/10
It was one of the newest leaves on the plant when I cut it off
This leaf cutting trial also ended up testing how much heat the leaf cuttings can handle.
In the place I lived, there were no controls for the heat, so combined with the heat from the fixture I used (with really crappy bulbs) the temps were around 85-90 F most of the time. Once the lights shut off, the room temp was still around 75-80 degrees F. Somehow, the leaves didn’t decay at all…
After about a month and a half, I finally saw the first growth!
4/2/10
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/graomogolensis/leaf_cuttings/4-2-10.JPG
4/16/10
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/...tings/Drosera_graomogolensis_leaf_cutting.JPG
At this point, I finally found some free time to pot them up in waterlogged NZ long-fibered sphagnum.
I put the cuttings under a fixture with better (cooler) bulbs and this is what they looked like after 1 week:
4/23/10
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/...osera_graomogolensis_leaf_cutting_planted.JPG
5/7/10
very large file: http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/graomogolensis/leaf_cuttings/Grao_leaf_cutting_5-7-10_hi-res.JPG
View of the other side:
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/...lensis_leaf_cutting_backside-5-7-10_large.JPG
The best part about this process was that the mother plant was able to recover in only 2 months. This picture was taken 4/24/10, and you can’t even tell that I took 5 leaf cuttings!
http://www.growsundews.com/sundews/graomogolensis/large_D_Graomogolensis_4-24-10.JPG
Just to show you how fast of a grower D. graomogolensis is, the picture above was taken one year and one month after this picture (for reference, the plant in the picture below is about 2 times the size of the leaf cutting plantlets):
So if all goes well, I should have a few more plants to spread around in a year or 2.
As you’ve seen, the newest leaves produce a ton of plantlets (actually too many to the point they’re going to choke each other out). Also, even some of the older leaves were able to produce 4-5 plantlets per leaf, but definitely not as many as the newest ones.
Big thanks to Crystal for letting me know this was possible!!!!!! Otherwise, I doubt I would have tried this for another half-year (I am very protective over my plants lol).