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Imagine

  • #21
Even if they did get a vft that required no dormancy period,what is the sense? There are no bugs in winter so it would grow slow anyway,although i guess the domesticated ones would still be getting fed by their growers but the main point is that nature has made them evolve like this for a reason(s) and you can't really go changing a thing of nature just because people want to enjoy it all year round-go and buy a nep if u wanna enjoy it all year round,but personly i don't think a three month dormancy period is too much to ask for,i mean it's only 12 weeks-thats nothing!
 
  • #22
Mondo,
I could get bugs from the pet shop during the winter.
 
  • #23
In my opinion, if plants were ment to be as they are in nature we would not have a jillion kinds of tea rose or funky colored flytraps. There is, and always will be a place for the strictly natural plants in propagation but I think that the altering of plants has given us some of the most attractive plants in existance. Look at the various Sarracenia hybrids for example. If you want an evergreen flytrap then go for it! I imagine that if you gathered up a lot of the different varieties and mutations and kept them growing under lights and see who weakened least in a given time, them crossed your two winners and repeated, it would eliminate the least suitable quickly and, with any luck, you should have a suitable plant in 10 or 15 years, really lucky in 5-10. Plus it's a really good excuse to have several hundred flytraps around the house! Follow your hearts desire, choose your goals wisely, GO FOR IT!

P.S. if you end up with a cup trap red fused tooth giant flytrap, I am interested!
 
  • #24
Echo... Echo.... :eek:)

It would take a bit longer than 10 15 years I expect, each plant would need to be raised to maturity (so that it can flower) and then at least two years on either side of a dormancy to see how the plant handles itself, and of course, you would need to continue watching the older plants long after you have moved on to the next few generations... it would be very involved, but you know what they say about building a better mouse trap!
 
  • #25
Yep, I always forget about that long maturation time, another challenge is that you would have to rest your plant to get blooms to do the hybridization, so some type of yearly cycle would have to trigger it even if it was not a full blown 4 month hibernation. Of corse the plants will bloom at about 3 years, so if your plant had been kept at 14 hour days for 3 years and was doing fine then a drop to 10 hours then back to 14 over a couple of months might trigger flowering without inducing dormancy, but if none of the plants went 3 years then you might be passing your project on to your grandkids some day! You never know until you try! I was thinking that a stem forming VFT would be cool, 20 points on an 18" bush, muahahaha, now where did that Frankenstein Jr. gene splicing kit go......
 
  • #26
If people were supposed to play around with nature like this we would have been born with special kits for which to do so.
 
  • #27
But MOndo... we were! It's called the Human Brain, and it's the best kit on the block! :eek:)
 
  • #28
Modo if wedidn't monkey around with nature we wouldn't be talking about these amazing plants right now!
 
  • #29
No nep g we could still talk about these plants with out mucking around with nature.
LOL i mean have people just become so impatient that they have to distrupt the cycle of organisms that have been on this planet a lot longer than us,and have thrived until we came along,just for there pleasure?.These plants were going fine by themselves until we decided to take them out of their natural habitat and grow them in pots...how many flytraps die in cultivation each year?Hundreds i dare say,just go down to your local supermarket and check out the plant section and i am sure you will find some deteriorating flytraps to one side.And how many flytraps remain in the wild? No where near as many as there once was,it was only in 1999 that two million flytraps were taken from the wild-all thanks to human interfearance this plant is now on the endangered list.
I mean disturbing the dormancy cycle of flytraps like this could lead to problems we haven't even thought of or could be catastrophic...i mean it's always happening today,some miracle wonder drug comes out on the market but only years later do people find out it has serious side affects
And Ram if the human brain is so great than why are flytraps on the endangered list?

(Edited by Mondo at 9:44 pm on Dec. 16, 2001)
 
  • #30
well, regardless of whether the flytrap is on the endangered list or not, the human brain is a pretty incredible thing...

And just so you know, I agree with you, no tinkering.

ANd I was just having fun!
 
  • #31
Oh Mondo there's harm in us dreaming though ....Right? We're not hurting nothing and even if "they" came up with a vft plant that didn't require dormacy I seriously doubt if it would affect those plants in the wild. Actually if you think about it the more vft plants are produced and available the less likely it is that someone goes on a vft saffari and picks the wild ones. Now if there was one that didn't require dormacy just think how that would be even more desireable to those that sold them. #### they would become so much more in demand. So realy if you were at the store and saw one of each wich would you choose?
But when it comes down to it it's just a dream and there's no harm in dreaming....Right?
 
  • #32
Just choose all of them, there're so irrestible!
 
  • #33
I don't understand why, I mean. The sundew family have plants both dormancy, such as D. Roundifolia and non-dormancy such as D. Capensis, plants. The Bladderwort family has the same situation. U. Tricolor requires no dormancy while the U. Dictoma (I think thats how its spelled) requires dormancy. Why can't it be possible to have VFT require no dormancy if these family have them? Hmmmm?
 
  • #34
Oh thats because there is only one species of vft but many varieties and there r many different species of sundews and many different varieties of each species....
 
  • #35
nailed it on the head Mondo.

The Venus Flytrap is a Monotypic species, one kind, thats it... Dionea Miscupula (I probably butcherd the spelling here.. but so what... I am tired... :eek:)

Any how, it's natural range exists across only a few hundred square miles in total area (I expect) not over thousands and thousands of miles, for instance, why would a plant that lives in a jungle need to go dormant? There is food around every day of the year, but it's relative a thousand miles north or south will expeince winter, where insects become few and far between, and growing flytraps that might get tripped by winter rain, snow fall, or sleet, or damaged by hail, or any number of things that endanger it in the wild, would actually provides a WEAKER PLANT.

Don't you understand that whether you believe in a Creation or an Evolution model that the flytrap is perfectly Created, or Adapted to it's environment, there is no way around that. In The wild, tha plant is AS IT SHOULD Be.

Now, you want to mess with it in cultivation, go AHEAD! By all means! It has already been done, that is how we get red and green dragons, dente, sawtooths, pom poms, and so forth... want one that will never go dormant? Do IT. It will take you half a century probably!

:eek:)

I will be about 75 I think by the time it is done, if it is ever done... and at an age where as a retiree I can truly enjoy the plant! So Go for it!
 
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