Does anyone grow carnivorous plants?

[twilliard]

I think you should plan on being able to remove the carnivorous plants from the terrarium during the wintering period. They grow very fast anyways, you'll want to remove them in winter to divide them or a 10g will be over run. You might want to think about height as well. If you put a screen top or light on the tank you might need shorter varieties like the S. pupurea. The winter process is very important to them, and they usually don't do well if you try and skip it. I move mine to my north facing colder windows during the winter with my orchids to get them all chilly and less light.

May I PM you?
Can you help me with what I am looking to do?

 

[ludnix]

For sure, PM or posts in here I will answer what I can. I kept my nepenthes in a terrarium for a while with other carnivorous plants. I have a coworker from a previous job who has a much more impressive collection as well, I'll see if I can get him to post his setup as well.

 

[ReeferBob]

I remember reading that carnivorous plants are commonly found around meteor impact sites. Is that true?

 

[twilliard]

That is a good one lol

So here is what I am going to do. (New plan)
My 46g tank has a small leak and will be shutting it down going into my new 75g tank.
I want to use this bow front tank for my terrarium
Now the problem is the species of plants that require dormancy which will be mixed with non dormancy plants.
Do I leave them in pots so I can remove them for winter time?
Thank you @ludnix for any help!

 

[ludnix]

I think that's an older hoax to imply that they are alien, but if you give them access to streaming water and nutrient poor soil they can do very well. If an impact site from long ago had a river or stream running through it today, they may do very well in there. They grow all across the United States, here in california we have a species call Darlingtonia californica, also known as the cobra lilly. Their pitchers look cobra like and even appear to have a little forked tongue. Very alien looking!

I used to keep this variety in a pond outside. They have small transparent windows on the top of their cobra head. This allows insects to enter them and feel like they can still fly out and escape. When they try to fly out they bounce around and eventually fall into the tube with downward pointing hair and slick surfaces trapping them. Cutting open these outdoor pitchers and you could see a solid 8-10" of dead insects all the way up the tube. They are amazingly effective.

 

[ludnix]

That is a good one lol

So here is what I am going to do. (New plan)
My 46g tank has a small leak and will be shutting it down going into my new 75g tank.
I want to use this bow front tank for my terrarium
Now the problem is the species of plants that require dormancy which will be mixed with non dormancy plants.
Do I leave them in pots so I can remove them for winter time?
Thank you @ludnix for any help!

I think leaving them in pots is a good solution, you can usually get live or dead mosses to hide them fairly well. Potting them may allow you to keep other plants with different soil requirements as well. I had done a tropical terrarium before which had nutrient rich soil for the whole display, but the carnivorous were in pots with their usual soil mixes of sand and peat moss.

 

[twilliard]

Thank you!
I am aiming for plants that require the 2" of water to try not to make an imbalance of requirements.
I want to also have a darlingtonia but not sure if it would be compatible

 

[ludnix]

The vertical pitcher plants like Saracenia and Darlingtonia are pretty similar and very hardy. I think they could be grown with a wide variety of other plants as long as their roots are reaching the water. The Nepenthes is more difficult in my experience, it can do well with the others too, but it won't produce it's pitchers unless it's in a very humid environment (should be easy in a terrarium). Sun dews are also very easy and butterworts as well. I think the venus fly traps can be the more picky of the options but they might just have a different environment than the others since they are from the east coast. People trying to trigger the traps frequently also stresses them and makes them harder to keep.

Do you know what other plants you want to keep with them? I have only tried other typical terrarium plants and tropicals myself. I'm sure whatever you pick you'll have good luck with, they are all much easier than SPS corals!

 

[twilliard]

The vertical pitcher plants like Saracenia and Darlingtonia are pretty similar and very hardy. I think they could be grown with a wide variety of other plants as long as their roots are reaching the water. The Nepenthes is more difficult in my experience, it can do well with the others too, but it won't produce it's pitchers unless it's in a very humid environment (should be easy in a terrarium). Sun dews are also very easy and butterworts as well. I think the venus fly traps can be the more picky of the options but they might just have a different environment than the others since they are from the east coast. People trying to trigger the traps frequently also stresses them and makes them harder to keep.

Do you know what other plants you want to keep with them? I have only tried other typical terrarium plants and tropicals myself. I'm sure whatever you pick you'll have good luck with, they are all much easier than SPS corals!

Sundews are one of may favorite
What I am looking to do is a base of butterworts and Sundews with a few fly traps scattered. On the outsides of this I am wanting a darlingtonia one on each side.
I don't think I have the height for Nepenthes but sarracenia catches my eyes with the darlingtonia

 

[ludnix]

The nepenthes might okay if you do decide to try them. They can develop either ground pitchers or hanging pitchers depending on their environment. The ground pitchers look like the hanging ones but can grow almost half way into the soil, they make for neat traps for crawling insects. It sounds like you have great setup in mind, I hope you post pictures when you get it going!

I found a few old photos from when I first setup the 40b. It definitely took some time for the moss to color up and everything to grow in. They were all in their pots but hidden by moss and rock layers.


This was the bromiliad setup with a few butterworts in it later:


A very young and small nepenthes. I think this was cultured from California Carnivores:

 

[twilliard]

The nepenthes might okay if you do decide to try them. They can develop either ground pitchers or hanging pitchers depending on their environment. The ground pitchers look like the hanging ones but can grow almost half way into the soil, they make for neat traps for crawling insects. It sounds like you have great setup in mind, I hope you post pictures when you get it going!

I found a few old photos from when I first setup the 40b. It definitely took some time for the moss to color up and everything to grow in. They were all in their pots but hidden by moss and rock layers.


This was the bromiliad setup with a few butterworts in it later:


A very young and small nepenthes. I think this was cultured from California Carnivores:

Beutiful!
Now how do you feed them within a terrarium?
In the past as a child I would take a cup of fishing maggots and let them hatch. Is this still feasible?

 

[ludnix]

I don't think any of them really require food unless they are in completely nutrient devoid environments, but if you're doing sundews and butterworts, you can buy flightless fruitflies online or from a exotic pet shop and they are great food source. You can breed those own your own once you get a few of them, lots of instructions online and easy to do. I think the hatched fishing maggots would work great too, you just have the worry of them flying out and getting in your home. I used to keep poison dart frogs so I kept the fruit flys around for them. I don't currently feed any of my non-terrarium carnivorous plants and they really don't catch much being indoors but still do fine.

 

[twilliard]

I don't think any of them really require food unless they are in completely nutrient devoid environments, but if you're doing sundews and butterworts, you can buy flightless fruitflies online or from a exotic pet shop and they are great food source. You can breed those own your own once you get a few of them, lots of instructions online and easy to do. I think the hatched fishing maggots would work great too, you just have the worry of them flying out and getting in your home. I used to keep poison dart frogs so I kept the fruit flys around for them. I don't currently feed any of my non-terrarium carnivorous plants and they really don't catch much being indoors but still do fine.

Thank you for the information :)
This will be a fun adventure for me and the kids
I have never done one this big and appreciate all your input!

 

[twilliard]

And also is there worry of stagnant water since using an aquarium?

 

[ludnix]

And also is there worry of stagnant water since using an aquarium?

I think it makes it more likely to get root-rot or other mold problems if it's stagnant at the bottom. This older article suggests arranging rocks to make a small pool somewhere in the tank for water to be easily siphoned out of.

http://www.pitcherplant.com/terrarium.html

 

[twilliard]

I think it makes it more likely to get root-rot or other mold problems if it's stagnant at the bottom. This older article suggests arranging rocks to make a small pool somewhere in the tank for water to be easily siphoned out of.

http://www.pitcherplant.com/terrarium.html

Thank you again!
So much help.
How long have you been growing these plants?

 

[ludnix]

Off and on for about 10 years, the Nepenthes are newer to me, the one pictured in the terrarium is now living in my kitchen and is about 5-6 years old now. The earlier photos of the Saracenias are new acquisitions from just a few months ago. I personally haven't had great luck with fly traps long term. I usually can keep them about a year before I do something to upset them, but the rest are very hardy and easy to keep. They make a great companion hobby for reefers as well since they benefit from the RO water too!

 

[twilliard]

Thank you!
So fly traps are hard to manage?
@GREEF stricken is starting a tank also

 

[zoomonster]

I've always been a plant nut long before I discovering reefing. I don't have as many as I used to after moving around a few years but my collection is growing again now that I settled for hopefully the end run. I have a variety of things but I have the most of bromeliads and tillandsia's. I was also long ago attracted to carnivorous plants and have had a variety over the years. Right now I just have a couple hanging baskets of nepenthes but more on the horizon. One of these days I want to put in a bog garden and populate it with terrestrial pitcher plants, flytraps, sundew etc.

BTW someone mentioned carnivorous plant in the FL wild. I don't explore as much as I used to but I have only ever seen one and that was a wild pitcher plant growing in northern FL near camp Rudder. I occasionally park my boat various places along the St. Johns river and checkout wild areas and have never seen any.

 

[ludnix]

For me they have been, but I honestly haven't given them as much effort as the others. They are pretty common and easy to find so they can't be that difficult I would imagine. The Savage Garden should have a chapter dedicated to their care (that I don't think I bothered to read when I kept them!).