Sundews in the cold

The sundews, or Drosera, are magnificent plants and one of the reasons I got into carnivorous plants to begin with. I first came across them in the early 1990s on a family drive, when my father spotted some from the car and stopped to show us. Interestingly, they were Drosera spathulata var. gympiensis, which was then undescribed.

Watering and trays…

Watering can be a huge chore if you have lots of plants. It used to be a double pain for me, because I used the styrofoam boxes made for holding vegetables. While they were cheap and did the job, they never held quite enough water to see me through the hottest months of summer. And they would always dry up just in time for the hottest day. This happened to me just after Christmas 2010. They trays were full one day, the next, I had dying Dionaea. As each tray only held 3 Sarracenia (8 if they were in 120mm pots), it also took me at least 40 minutes to make sure they were all filled. I still use some of these trays for my S. purpurea type plants, along with overflow S. flava from the greenhouse:

 

The week ending Sunday 31 August…

As the days start to get longer, the dormant plants in the greenhouse start to show signs of breaking dormancy. One of the first to break dormancy, an all red S. alata I call “Biddlecombe Red”, put on a good start with flower buds and a couple of new pitchers. Sarracenia alata is a problem for me here because they break dormancy way too early and burn badly. This plant was no exception and its new pitchers were burned during the two coldest days this winter (–8*C and –7*C). The flower bud is so far intact and looks to be the fastest growing of the handful of flower buds coming up.