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Suggestions needed of which Nepenthes might be suitable for my bathroom.

Hi,

I'm looking for some suggestions of a Nepenthes that might be suitable for my bathroom. I have a location that's less that a foot away from a window and receives good light and a few hours of direct sunlight a day - this far north we get long summer but very short winter days. I had a ×ventrata in there, which grew really well in the summer and survived winter with little growth. I've since moved it to another location though. I've replaced it with a N. fusca (flared peristome), but it's really not doing that well. Ideally I need a plant that does not get too big. It's a little difficult to give specific details of conditions, such as temperature, humidity etc, as they vary so much dependant on time of day and year, so something that is not too fussy would be ideal.

Any suggestion?

Thanks,

Carl
 
How long have you had the N. fusca in the bathroom? Some nepenthes take a while to settle in, My N. rafflesiana did nothing and looked ugly for a year before it started growing and pitcher in low humidity HL environment on my windowsill.

I would say N. sanguinea is the easiest and most forgiving one, the orange kind that it. The only downside is that it does get on the large side. I'm not sure, but N. tenuis seems to be a rather hardy and tolerant plant, but its expensive.

N. spectablis x aristolochioides is easy, and is also hardy and stays relatively small.

I would also recommend N. truncata, N. 'Lady Pauline', and N. ventricosa, since I ahvee good experience with these in household conditions.
 
The N. fusca has been in the bathroom for a couple of months; however, I have had this plant for years and it's never really done anything. N. ventrata on the other hand grows like a weed in summer, so I'm looking for something that likes similar conditions, as I don't want another ventrata.
 
Perhaps you could try Wistuba's lowland N. veitchii. It is a fairly slow grower and does well in low light conditions, especially in our northern winters.

We live at 54 degrees latitude, so on Dec 21 we're only getting 7.5 hours of daylight, and mine acclimated and grew through the winter indoors nicely on a window sill, and Alberta is quite arid, so it might do very well for you in a bathroom with the extra humidity.

dvg
 
I live at 57.5° latitude, so that could work. Though lowlanders usually need higher temperatures than my bathroom would get to at winter night times.
 
I grow N. bellii, x. coccinea and x. "edinensis" (the mis-ID'ed one, not the real one) in my bathroom with great success. The bathroom is the most insulated room in the apartment and by keeping the door shut most of the time it stays slightly warmer and more humid than my other growing areas. If you're going to do windowsill growing, though, then a highlander might be more appropriate. N. ventricosa x inermis is a small plant that's always been a reliable performer for me.
N. sanguinea is kind of pedestrian so far as collectors are concerned, but a great candidate. I grew one in my kitchen window that performed amazingly. It came to me as a rescue plant in a two-inch pot of peat and perlite, and quickly died down to the roots. I ignored it and eventually it came back from a basal and grew into a respectable rosette, but I didn't bother repotting because I already had a basket overflowing with sanguinea. So, the runt became my test subject. I ended up placing it in the top of a large jar on my windowsill which I'd been rooting pothos cuttings in. Occasionally I would fill the jar enough so that the water line touched the bottom of the pot, but mostly I just top-watered it occasionally, and often would forget about it and let it get much too dry. But it kept chugging along and actually hit a huge growth spurt with that treatment - I think by the time I got rid of it it was making seven-inch pitchers and was well over a foot across.
Also, I think dvg is onto something with veitchii. I don't know if really needs to be a lowland variety, but veitchii is on the slow side and has very robust foliage, so it should be able to take most anything you can throw at it (truncata too.) An alternative idea would be to go for a plant that grows quickly and possibly even quite large, and simply plan on cutting it back once or twice a year; maxima hybrids and closely related species might be worth a shot. (I'm surprised fusca has been a no-go for you - perhaps it gets too much direct light?) In my experience, many of the miniature species are a little more picky about their conditions, so you'll likely be fighting an uphill battle to keep them happy if conditions aren't stable.
You're a pretty handy grower so I think it's probably safe to just try the first plant that you like that can be had for the right price. But I don't blame you for doing a little research first. Have you ever seen Nepenthes Around the House? You might be able to find some good info there.
~Joe
 
I grow every single nepenthes I own in my bathroom. I like the bathroom because showers provide extra humidity. Also, I can open a window at night and turn on the exhaust fan to cool the room down most months of the year.

My only issue is cooling in the heat of summer. I should also mention that I do not rely on my window alone for lighting. My master bathroom is rather large so it allows me to have two shelves with shop lighting and such.

But I guess with what you are planning (a windowsill nepenthes), the bathroom would probably be ideal for a variety of nepenthes in the intermediate to highland range provided you have a window that will open and maybe an exhaust fan if you need to provide cooling at night.

Probably the best looking nepenthes I have in my conditions is N. 'Lady Pauline'. But there are some close runners up like N. 'Efflugent Koto', N. Sanguinea, N. xSplendiana x xMixta, N. truncata x spectabilis to name a few.
 
I live at 57.5° latitude, so that could work. Though lowlanders usually need higher temperatures than my bathroom would get to at winter night times.

Well of course it does depend how cold your bathroom gets down to on those chilly winter nights, but we let it get down to 15C at night here in the winter and the plant is growing slowly, but well.

dvg
 
You could always try putting a jamban in your bathroom....;)

Seriously, I've heard it has fairly low light needs and doesn't get very big, so it might actually do well.
 
  • #10
I had an N. ventrata growing in our bathroom window. It flowered in February but since its daylength cues were from the window, it stopped pitchering from November until the middle of spring.

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  • #11
N. x Judith Finn (N. spathulata x veitchii) is a possibility. It's not a plant that is typically coveted by collectors, but it is easy and will stay small for quite a while. I had one that I didn't really want, and it seemed to thrive on my brutal neglect. Even environmental changes didn't faze it. It was like a succulent. The leaves on the rosette were thick and fleshy, and the pitchers were lovely, surrounding the pot like tall sentries. It's a nice neat plant while it's still in the rosette stage.

Unless you want to switch to artificial lighting, there is little you can do to promote growth in the winter. In northern latitudes, nepenthes growing in natural light will almost always slow down considerably, even to a full stop, in the winter due to the shortened photo period.
 
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