Connors Sundews

[stevebradford]

They deal with rain and condensing humidity in the natural environment to get them wet once and a while is not the end of the plant. Interestingly there are some articles that mention a sundew will only regenerate is mucilage a few times before discarding the leaf much like its descendant the Venus flytrap.

Taking pictures in the bogs of sundews when there is condensing humidity the mucilage looks amazing but you will struggle to find any trapped bugs. When the weather is better the mucilage droplets are smaller and stickier you can see how much with your finger if you touch a leaf. If people are interested I’m sure I could easily put together a little demonstration in another thread using Drosera capensis.

 

[MimiStew24]

Yes spraying a sundew with water may temporarily make the dew look better and stickier. That water will dissolve the sundews special glue compounds making it less sticky, less able to catch bugs. The water will soon evaporate leaving the plant to replenish its glue and is not helping the plant.

Cheers Steve!!
Humidity reaches 90% at night if fam turns off and stays 80% in day. I got tH20 and two LEDs can’t be the lighting!

It must be the soil some how?? It’s perlite spag.
They are sitting In water too!

I’m so confused!

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

As I mentioned, my dews sometimes get the dwindles for no obvious reason. Since the humidity is high, try stopping the spraying. Also try putting the pot in a little dish. Water from below when the soil is just moist and not soaking. Let the dish water dry out in between. Try these 2 suggestions and observe over a week or two.

 

[MimiStew24]

As I mentioned, my dews sometimes get the dwindles for no obvious reason. Since the humidity is high, try stopping the spraying. Also try putting the pot in a little dish. Water from below when the soil is just moist and not soaking. Let the dish water dry out in between. Try these 2 suggestions and observe over a week or two.

Yes sir! Thank you

 

[MimiStew24]

So did some adjustments for the sundews (
D. Spats & TOKs) Put them all in one container & lid at bottom, let’s see if this helps!

 

[MimiStew24]

They deal with rain and condensing humidity in the natural environment to get them wet once and a while is not the end of the plant. Interestingly there are some articles that mention a sundew will only regenerate is mucilage a few times before discarding the leaf much like its descendant the Venus flytrap.

Taking pictures in the bogs of sundews when there is condensing humidity the mucilage looks amazing but you will struggle to find any trapped bugs. When the weather is better the mucilage droplets are smaller and stickier you can see how much with your finger if you touch a leaf. If people are interested I’m sure I could easily put together a little demonstration in another thread using Drosera capensis.
View attachment 12279

yes pls Steve that would be awesome!

 

[MimiStew24]

Don’t mist sundews. It’s not the end of the world for them but they don’t like that and it’s not going to help them dew up. In the wild it will rain on them and wash the dead bugs off the leaves and they will lose their dew temporarily.
If there’s a problem with them not dewing one of these five things is off:

- Light
- Temperature
- Humidity
- Soil
- recently disturbed

My guess in your case would either be lack light or humidity. Try turning your terrarium fan off. And if your sundews are green not pink or red increase your lighting. Pictures help
View attachment 12278

very interested, none of my Ds have turned red yet. I do Have 3 lights in the tank Steve! T2H0 and two LEDs. My D. Hams are red.

 

[stevebradford]

How happy Drosera tokaiensis should look with enough lighting.

Not sure but it sounds like you might be moving and transplanting your sundews frequently? If you move them even in the pot to different conditions you can loose the mucilage for up to a couple weeks. Here’s an example of one moved recently and how unhappy it looks. It will recover in time.

If you haven’t moved them in weeks and the new leaves aren’t turning at least pinkish they aren’t getting enough light.

I don’t know much about lighting but @Carson Hardy mentioned fluorescent lights can loose part of their spectrum over time and still put out visible light?

One other thought is temperature, how hot is it getting in there with all those lights? Don’t let it get over 25 degrees C. in fact most of the common sundews are happy growing at 15 degrees C.

 

[MimiStew24]

How happy Drosera tokaiensis should look with enough lighting.
View attachment 12339
Not sure but it sounds like you might be moving and transplanting your sundews frequently? If you move them even in the pot to different conditions you can loose the mucilage for up to a couple weeks. Here’s an example of one moved recently and how unhappy it looks. It will recover in time.
View attachment 12340


If you haven’t moved them in weeks and the new leaves aren’t turning at least pinkish they aren’t getting enough light.

I don’t know much about lighting but @Carson Hardy mentioned fluorescent lights can loose part of their spectrum over time and still put out visible light?

One other thought is temperature, how hot is it getting in there with all those lights? Don’t let it get over 25 degrees C. in fact most of the common sundews are happy growing at 15 degrees C.

fantastic, cheers Steve! Really appreciate it! It great you have same species as me so we can relate! You know what I have moved my sundews about couple times in last two months and I just moved them again into their final home which I posted in green tupaware. Gosh I hope I can get them back after this. Might take few months.

I find it struggle that they wasn’t happy as very hardy species but hey who doesn’t like change at best of times even us humans!

May guys deffo look like your guy that got moved. Looks brown leaf matter & no dews however they are green & growing.

my sundews are currently in with my Nep collection.
It gets to around 24C during the day & the fan runs all day on medium speed and humidity stays at around 80% all day & night. Night temps drop to 20C. During the night my fan runs every other hour. Before I got my indoor terria I had my dews in a humidity box outside all summer in the shaded light in garden and my tok was really dewy. we had temps at 35 C some days in summer!


i got food wrap on top of the terria top with lots of ventilation holes and I put too big holes in food wrap at back so the air can circulate around & back up through back of the terria. So deffo not too hot as my Nepenthes all growing and pitching.

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

Just keep things the same for a while.

 

[MimiStew24]

Just keep things the same for a while.

yup LLoyd! Just going to keep it all same and see how they do in their new home and keep the bottom of the tupware out of water.

 

[MimiStew24]

JFYI guys- bought a pH water tester! I’m complete shock as it reads a stable of around 7.08. Which I’m pretty sure is neutral! :O I’m absolutely puzzled as my SARRS have been sitting in water for months & my U. Gibba is loving it and growing Like weed in the water.

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

I've really cut down spraying my dews, even the tuberous dews in room air and they seem to be looking better. At most a light spray of the surrounding air, more of a light mist.

 

[MimiStew24]

Couple weeks has been and still no sign of mucus on the dews and they still look the same. I’m absolutely baffled why they are not looking pretty.
I’ve added live spaghum moss as top dressing. Maybe this might help them somehow.

 

[MimiStew24]

Couple weeks has been and still no sign of mucus on the dews and they still look the same. I’m absolutely baffled why they are not looking pretty.
I’ve added live spaghum moss as top dressing. Maybe this might help them somehow.

So few weeks has passed and still no changes in the D.Spats & Toks sundews, weirdest thing is they are growing but not producing dews & wilting the under growth.

Im not sure if too much disturbance has cause this over few months but they haven’t had mucilage since September.
I put spagnum moss as top dressing too week or so ago to see and they are not sitting in the water at bottom of tank that had neutral ph of 7 few weeks ago, I put some spag at bottom and ph is now 7.59. My D. Hams seem to like it and are growing amongst the U. Gibba.

I’ve run out of ideas for the dews!

 

[MimiStew24]

@stevebradford

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

Often my dews seem to dwindle over time. Others go on for years. I've noticed that stopping spraying seems to have helped. I'm thinking of keeping the medium just damp and not soaking in water and seeing if it helps.
I forget to water my Andromeda and adelae (again). The medium was completely dry but the leaves still had dew and were nice and green (some had turned brown). So I'm thinking that maybe less water is good. Maybe more air to the roots?

 

[Peatmoss]

Definitely agree with Lloyd that some of my sundews just stop growing nicely after a while, I usually chop the rosettes off and let them regrow from the roots, that usually works.

I do think that Lloyd is on to something with letting the medium dry out a bit instead of keeping it constantly wet, I've always had better luck (especially with shallow pots) with letting the trays dry out between watering, it doesn't have to be for very long (mine don't go past two weeks without a refill), but I suspect the media contracting draws air into voids that were previously filled with water and helps oxygenate the roots.

 

[stevebradford]

Sorry was busy at work.

I also third what was said above, although I haven’t had that issue of sundews taking a break from growing yet.

Here’s a blown up shot of your sundew it looks very wet on the leaves, remember I believe leaves washed of dew too often won’t regenerate that dew. The new replacement leaves will try to dew but it looks like you still have some top watering issue to correct.

 

[MimiStew24]

Sorry was busy at work.

I also third what was said above, although I haven’t had that issue of sundews taking a break from growing yet.

Here’s a blown up shot of your sundew it looks very wet on the leaves, remember I believe leaves washed of dew too often won’t regenerate that dew. The new replacement leaves will try to dew but it looks like you still have some top watering issue to correct.
View attachment 12600

Cheer guys.

Looks like my dews are getting the mist off my Nepenthes. I’ve got to separate sundews in one section of the terria to avoid this access mist put them with my Ceph.

I’m start to think something in soil is affecting their growth. I’m totally puzzled! It’s like they get all new growth and then leaves go brown and then they grow back again. In like matter of 2 weeks.