Growth and feeding poll

[dlybrand]

Egg water sounds very useful and very easy! I need to try that... My house has huge amounts of ladybugs in it. They both wander in and I feed them by hand, so there was no accurate choice for me on the poll, and I chose the "infrequently catch their own prey" choice. In any case, DON'T FEED YOUR PLANTS LARVAE!!! Maggots or ant larvae or anything are high in fat and your plants will rot every last pitcher off.

-D. Lybrand

BTW- for those of you who use orchid fertilizer, should I use half-strength? That's what I've heard. Also, I have some 20-14-13 but also some 11-35-15 which is used for inflorescences. Because Nepenthes put a lot of energy into their pitchers, which are very colourful and presumably use many of the same resources as flowers, might this work well also?

[Flip_Side_the_Pint]

hmm I feed my neps waxworms which are really fatty as they are some kind of moth larvae. They don't rot, hmm..... maybe you're putting to many? or to big in a to small pitcher?

[dlybrand]

It is possible that it is only ant larvae... they are extremely moist and simply rotted in the pitcher. Maybe they were too big for the pitchers, as they would be quickly digested if small enough. You are right, probably just too large, but I have heard elsewhere that other larvae are also bad...

-D. Lybrand

[Lam_wn]

Hi, I voted for the option that my plants catch all the food they need and i dont feed them at all. I live in Spore (tropicla) so I only rear lowlanders but one thing I realized over the years is that ants and lowlanders(because I cannot make this generalization to include plants I dont keep) have a some relationship because of 2 points:
1. The more plants I have, the more ants and ant nests there are around my garden
2. I observed and also read about the relation of ants and Neps where the plant rarely catches any ants but actually feeds them with its nectar. The ants depend on the plant for survival and frequent it. once in a while, 1 or 2 ants fall prey but this is insignificant to the colony and this is all the plant needs to pile up tens of thousands over time and get all the nuitrients it requires, hence it isnt a one way thing.
Lastly, want to just tell all those out there who feed your plant: When a pitcher opens, its contents are pure water and probably some superoxide. However, when prey fall in and STRUGGLE, the pitcher is stimulated to release enzymes...So, if you want to feed the plant, make sure the first meal each pitcher has is a LIVE INSECT and not fish food freeze dried etc.
Lam

[endparenthesis]

Quote[/b] (seedjar @ Dec. 13 2004,8:51)]In the past two months, since starting the egg water, my plant has pitchered more than it did in the entire two years I had it before that. It put out two new vines at its base shortly after I began watering, and has developed four tiny pitchers on the new leaders and three modest 2" pitchers (it was in a 2" pot until last week) on the original shoot since.
Before the egg water, I'd had four, maybe five pitchers total in almost two years. I know that isn't much output in general, but I've had this guy on fairly low light (western window and one two-foot 40-watt fluorescent) for the majority of his stay with me. I consider the results I've seen with that egg water stuff to be pretty impressive, and I recommend that everyone try it if they haven't already. The details can be obtained off of Barry Rice's sarracenia.com FAQ page (it's in the FAQ library, with the Nepenthes guide.)

This is from the website:

Egg shells - This is something an old woman told me once. She said that the secret to her beautiful plants was a biweekly shot of egg shell water. Making egg shell water is a simple enough task. First, take the egg shells of six eggs. Put them in an oven at 300 degrees for about 15 minutes. Take them out and stuff them in to a 1 gallon water jug which may be capped. Fill the jug with hot water and let it sit in the sun for about a week. After that time, shake the jug vigorously and water your plants liberally.

As you may have guessed, the calcium from the shells probably leeches out during the time in the water, thus producing growth spurts. I have tried this myself except that I did this once a month during my normal feeding/fertilizing time. I did notice a spike in growth and I have been doing it ever since.

I'm curious, does anyone know why you set it in the sun? How would one make this stuff in the winter?

[BigCarnivourKid]

Just a guess but the sunlight would warm the water. Stuff disolves into warm water more easily than it does into cold water.

[Treaqum]

Since I put my highlanders outside they catch enough on their own

[endparenthesis]

Quote[/b] (BigCarnivourKid @ May 05 2005,8:14)]Just a guess but the sunlight would warm the water. Stuff disolves into warm water more easily than it does into cold water.

That's what I thought... in that case I'll just leave the bottle in my car.