FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

April 20, 2009
Yippee! Venus Flytrap flowering, pollination and seed-producing season is here! For some reason I love to hand-pollinate Dionaea trying to make interesting crosses. 3 days ago the first blossom opened. A day later one more opened, the fresh pollen of which I used to pollinate the first day's flower. Then yesterday a third and fourth blossom opened, and today the very first blossom from 3 days ago, very well pollinated, has just closed (its petals have curled inward), and 12 more blossoms have opened.

Peak Dionaea flowering / seed-producing season will soon be here, at least here in my location under my conditions. I think I'll have a good harvest this year.

(Matt--one of the Phalaenopsis orchids I pollinated is producing a seed pod. I may be able to send you seed after you get settled in Oregon.)

Lots of nice seeds this year. Yeah!
Steve

Congrats on a great crop this year, Steve! Do you have any more photos of some of the more interesting crosses you have made in the past? I'm liking the variety that I'm getting out of the bunch you sent me...

Adam wrote:Congrats on a great crop this year, Steve! Do you have any more photos of some of the more interesting crosses you have made in the past? I'm liking the variety that I'm getting out of the bunch you sent me...

I plan to take some photos of seed-grown plants a little later in the year when they have grown more. I like the variety I see: quite a few red ones, various ones with dentate type short cilia, lots of interesting shades and markings of red and green (and yellowish).

I hope that this year's seed crop will have the same fairly wide variety of color and form as last year's and the year before. One big difference this year is that I have a lot of B52 blooms that will contribute both pollen and seed, and I'm excited about that. Also, a substantial amount of Pink Venus, my favorite red clone, will add pollen and seed. I plan to pollinate the red Flytraps only with other red Flytraps for a different mix of seeds, but I'll still use the red Flytrap pollen to add to the mix of other crosses.

This year's seed producing plants: B52, Pink Venus, Royal Red, Red Piranha, Dutch, Low Giant, Big Vigorous, Justina Davis, Big Mouth, Fine Tooth x Red (another favorite of mine) and Dentate Traps. All of those clones will contribute to the seed harvest this year. Next year will probably see the addition of Sawtooth, Cupped Traps and Fused Tooth, all of which I'm growing quite a few of this year. In the future, WIP Red, WIP Snapper and WIP Slim, 3 clones from a very nice guy and old-time grower in southeast U.S., will be added for sale and contribute to seed production as well.

Awesome Steve! Sounds like you'll have some interesting seed to disperse this year. I'm away from my plants right now doing some remodeling on the house here in Oregon. I hope to be back in time to see my first flowers open. They stalks were getting pretty large and the pods looked like they would open within a couple of weeks.

Steve_D wrote:(Matt--one of the Phalaenopsis orchids I pollinated is producing a seed pod. I may be able to send you seed after you get settled in Oregon.)

That would be great! I can't wait to get some orchid seed going in vitro.

Hi,

I have a question about manual pollination.
When the flower opens, is the stigma immediately receptive for pollen or is it best to wait a few days?

Nice steve!

Oh I can't wait for the order when the seeds are ready.

Just a question how many seeds are you expecting this season?

NZL wrote:Hi,

I have a question about manual pollination.
When the flower opens, is the stigma immediately receptive for pollen or is it best to wait a few days?

It usually takes a day or two for the stigma to become receptive. When it's fuzzy, then it's ready to have some plant sex.

Matt wrote: then it's ready to have some plant sex.

That's great

NZL wrote:I have a question about manual pollination. When the flower opens, is the stigma immediately receptive for pollen or is it best to wait a few days?

As Matt said, the stigma usually becomes receptive about 24-48 hours (usually closer to 24) after the flower opens. By that time the filaments and anthers have fallen backward, which encourages cross-pollination. Here is a photo series I made a couple years ago to illustrate the process:

Can't wait. Good luck Steve!

Thanks for the photo guide Steve...
can't wait for my flowers to bloom!

Yea! I will plan to try some of the Red Flytrap cross seeds & also if you have B52 X any red variety that should be fun to try out too.

Mary

I'm having two flowerstalks emerging now and i'll try to cross them if they flower at the same time
It would be Cross Teeth x Red Burgundy and vice versa.

Maybe I'll be lucky and have a Burgundian Cross

Good to hear that seed production is well underway Steve. I'll definitely get you to send some some red derived seed with my next order.

Just curious - what tools do you use to hand pollinate (small, fine paintbrush?) and how many times do you pollinate your blooms while they are receptive??

mkburleson wrote:Yea! I will plan to try some of the Red Flytrap cross seeds & also if you have B52 X any red variety that should be fun to try out too.

Mary

Hi Mary-- I'm using all the B52 pollen I can gather (which is quite a lot) to pollinate many of the other clones, as well as many of the same crosses I made last year (which have produced a good variety of color and form in the seedlings), as well as the new "all red mix" that will have a limited amount of seeds, but will hopefully be interesting to grow. In the regular mix there will still be plenty of non-red plants (including plenty of B52s) that have been pollinated with red plants (Royal Red, Red Piranha and Pink Venus).

I'm thinking this will be a very good year for seed production. My plants are really starting to produce many blooms each day. Today's blooms are just now opening, and I'll use the pollen to pollinate all of yesterday's blooms. Looking really good so far, and I really enjoy doing this hand-pollination for some reason.

Best wishes, --Steve