History
My start in growing carnivorous plants is similar to what many in this
hobby have gone through, except that my first plant was not a venus
flytrap, but rather, a purple pitcher plant (Sarracenia purpurea purpurea)
and some round-leaved sundews (Drosera rotundifolia) collected from
a large open bog in New Brunswick. Because I lacked the proper knowledge
of their cultivation and dormancy requirements, the plants did not last
very long. Later on, I tried venus flytraps with no success for the
same reasons as above.
In the early 1980's I learned to drink at (i.e. attended) University
of Guelph where I discovered that they had a carnivorous plant collection.
The staff were kind enough to allow me to assist them in maintaining
this collection and I was able to obtain a few cuttings to get me started.
Over time, I learned more about the plants and their cultivation requirements
from a number of sources (books, internet, and people).
I started off growing the plants in a terrarium in doors. The sarracenia
never had a dormant period for about 17 years (in hindsight, I'm surprised
that they lasted). In 1997, I moved all the plants to pots and grew
them out of doors during the "friendly" months, moving them
to a florida room that was kept barely above freezing for the winter
months. The plants all thrived in this environment, flowering and pitchering
like crazy until the winter of 2002/2003. The heater that I used to
maintain the temperature of the florida room failed and I didn't notice
it until spring. That particular winter was very cold and I lost all
of my Dionaea and Sarracenia (even some purpurea purpurea).
In the spring of 2003, I restocked (with the help of Carl Mazur) and
over the summer, I decided to try my hand at building a bog garden,
which was laid out in the shape of a 6' Deep x 7' Wide x 10-12"
Deep triangle with rounded corners, basically a hole with pond liner
filled with peat moss and framed with decorative stonework.
We all know what a pain it can be to pre-wet peat moss. I found a very
easy and non-labour intensive recipe for producing the stuff.
Ingredients:
1 Wheel Barrow
1 Lawn Chair
1 Hose Running To Our Reverse Osmosis System
1 Bag of Peat Moss
1 8-Year-Old Daughter
- Sit daughter in lawn chair.
- Periodically add water and peat into the wheelbarrow.
- turn daughter loose on the mix and let her get dirty.
- add more water or peat as necessary.
- when the wheelbarrow gets full of wet mix, pour it into the garden
Repeat until bog garden is full! Feel free to substitute your own kids!
In the summer of 2003, it was ready for planting, and for a couple
of days, everything looked really good. Then, the bluejays found it
and kept scattering the nametags to a point where I could no longer
match them up with the plants anymore. The final straw was when the
birds discovered the bugs in the pitchers and shredded them all one
morning. I had to build a fence of bird-netting around and over the
garden, which was a pain, but a necessity.
As winter approached, I covered the bog with about 10-12" of pine
needles and hoped for the best. I had no idea if anything was going
to survive. Yesterday (March 25, 2004) I snuck a peek under the pine
needles in the very front portion of the bog and found healthy hibernacula
of Drosera rotundifolia, intermedia and linearis, and several healthy
Dionaea plants that had suffered absolutely no winter damage whatsoever.
They looked as good as they did in the fall, so I am very optimistic
about this project.
For the record, I am located in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada (about 60
miles west of Toronto). This past winter had two very cold months where
the daily highs were in the minus teens to twenties (celcius) with nighttime
lows that could approach 40 below. Our summers are usually fairly humid
(the last two years excluded as they were very dry) with temperatures
that can get into the low thirties.
For those who are interested, I will be maintaining a pictorial log
of the progress of the garden on this site, starting with a few pics
that I snapped in the fall of 2003. Each year will have its own page.
