Growing Carnivorous Pitcher Plants

Series Summary

Sarracenia carnivorous plants are commonly referred to as Pitcher Plants. This is because of the anatomy of the plant itself. Sarracenia plants have colorful leaves that form pitchers that hold nectar-like substances used to attract prey such as insects. Pitcher plants do not chew or “eat” these insects, but rather they produce enzymes that digest their prey for them. There are many species of pitcher plants that are native to North America. However, some people like to cultivate and propagate them in terrariums around the world. Sarracenia plants are not self pollinators and must be hand pollinated when grown in a terrarium.

In this series of expert video clips, watch and learn about Sarracenia carnivorous plants. Our cultivation expert will share with you basic tips such as growing pitcher plants. He suggests that it is very important to duplicate the natural environment of the species of pitcher plant you choose to grow. This will make the plant stronger and healthier in the long run. Learn how to perform propagation through division of your pitcher plants. Learn about Sarracenia dormancy and feeding periods in these informational clips. You will also find information about hybrids and tips on potting mix and watering techniques. Learn about your plants in the video titled “trapping mechanism” and learn how to weed and prune your plants to keep them healthy. In these educational videos, you will learn more about Sarracenia plants and all that they offer.

This series is an Equilibrio Films production.

Video Transcript

" Hi! My name is Wes on behalf of expertvillage.com and in this video segment, I am going to give you some basic growing tips about how to grow sarracenias. If you want to know more about carnivorous plants, you can visit us at equilibriocarnivorousplants.com. So probably the most important thing you want to focus on when you are growing sarracenias, is what particular sarracenia you have and what region it grows in. That is important because you want to replicate as best you can the conditions of the region in which your plant grows if you are growing it in cultivation. For example we have here a serracenia purpura subspecies. We grow this plant year round outside in New England and has no problem because it can withstand these cold winters here. Other plants like this sarracenia rubra or sarracenia flava, these grown in the Southern United States so they can’t stand the harsh winters outside here. You have to bring these plants inside during the winter and we are going to talk more about that later. All of these sarracenia species need very poor soil conditions. We grow them all in some type of peat moss mixture or something like that. Also another very common mistake is that people fertilize these plants. You really want to make sure absolutely never to fertilize these plants. Fertilizing them can kill them in a matter of days or weeks some times. Another things that is common about all the sarracenia species is that they need a lot of water. All of these pots are just absolutely soaking in water you can see here. We grow them in standing water most of the time and again, we are going to talk more about watering. All sarracenia’s grow in bog like conditions. Some of them grow in sphagnum bog, some of them grow in seepage bog, some of them grow almost entirely in the water so all these sarracenia’s need quite a bit of water. But again, just to reiterate what I said again, you really want to know what region these plants grow in so that you can replicate the conditions that they have in nature. "