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Attempting to grow n. bical as a house plant.

cprus

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The Story:

The background story goes like this. About October of last year my aquarium heater in my growth chamber broke and being the cheapo that I am I decided against buying a new one. My bical 'red flush' has always been a strong plant even when, "he" I guess, was a little 5 inch plant. Now being a big 20 inch monster who's taking over the chamber, I thought I'd see how he'll do without a heater. It didn't go so well with my raff clone 99 and my two amp, all three dried to a crisp (seriously, the leaves were alive but crispy no matter how much I watered) and stopped pitchering. Then I look at the bical and he's freakin' growing like crazy! He won't stop, the pitchers actually increased in size. The chamber before was at 80F and 80%+ humidity. Now it's at 58-60F and 50-60% humidity. How is this plant doing this with an acclimation time on only 2-3 weeks and for more than 4 months? And why are my easy neps getting wasted? I would've guessed the opposite.

Now:

Unfortunately, I bought a new heater so I can save the struggling 3 that almost died. My bical is back to his normal conditions of being spoiled but tonight I'm going to block off his area and open the chamber door on his end. I'm not letting him go back to the way he was, I liked my tough bical in 50% humidity.

The Future:

Maybe one day he'll be in my living room near a window and just maybe, he'll be strong enough one day for San Jose weather, just him and shade cloth for most of the year.


Anyway just though I'd share, seems cool enough.

Here's a picture from this month
BicalRed.jpg
 
You should feel that pitcher. It's very woody and thick. I often find my self squeezing it just because it's so darn tough, then I apologize for harassing him.

EDIT: Ha! it edited to darn.
 
Here he is outside for a nice walk in the kitchen.
Yes the pot is ugly but efficient, here's why. When I transplant all I have to do is cut the zip-ties and take apart the panels, so no uprooting, dumping, turning upside down, and most importantly less root disturbance.
NepRed2.jpg

NepRed3.jpg

Look I'm harassing that pitcher again.
 
I've been growin mine in about 50% humidity and it doesn't seem to mind. Temps are a little more civil at 68 - 80 F.
P1000194.jpg
P1000191.jpg


Mine isn't quite that big yet, but I did just repot it into a 10" pot. Only lost one leaf. I notice your pitchers are somewhat greenish. How much light does it get? Were they more red when it was smaller?
 
After reading this I might put both my young N. bicals in lower humidity conditions. I've been keeping them in a super humid 10 gallon terrarium but they don't seem to really like it in there all that much. I only did this because all I've read online is that N. bical absolutely needs high humidity to survive. I'm beginning to think that this is bunk
smile_n_32.gif


Since I live in Southern California it's always quite warm here, even in the winter. I'm hoping my plants will acclimate well!
 
Whatever you decide to do just do it slowly. This plants was from Cook's CP. I got it back in 2003 as a 4in seedling. He lived approx a year in true lowland conditons (hot and steamy) but for some reason never pitchered well or grew very large until I moved him into the chamber he's in now. Since then he's grown considerably and is pitchering very well. I opened the chamber doors last night and he's fine with it. I'm guessing this is one of those "super clones" of a particular species sort of like Philcula's rajah what was living in pretty "un-highland" conditions. I hope this guy will sent shoots soon and I'm hoping to get those out into the world so everyone can grow them without worrying about space.

As for the color, this one never produced very red pitchers mostly because I haven't been growing him under bright lights. I'm going to be increasing the number of lights within the next few weeks to further "harden" him for houseplant status.
 
I'll definitely do it all slowly. I also plan on getting a third N. bical in the near future. I'll grow that one in somewhat intermediate conditions and see what works best for this species.
 
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