FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

I bought a big terracotta pot

well did it planted my 3 b n q plants in perlite and John Innes no 2, I couldn't find any other peat? will this do?

when I took the plants out the pots there were roots that came out of what looked like a cylindrical base

I looked up John Innes no. 2 and came up with this:

JOHN INNES POTTING COMPOST No.2

for general potting of most house plants and vegetable plants into medium size pots or boxes. Contains double the amount of nutrient in JI No 1 to suit established plants.
7 Loam
3 Peat
2 Sand

each cubic metre of mix, add

0.6kg ground limestone
2.4kg hoof and horn meal
2.4kg superphosphate
1.2kg potassium sulphate

http://www.gardeningdata.co.uk/soil/joh ... _innes.php


If this is the same one, its not suitable for your VFTs as it has fertilizer in it. You need to get pure peat to mix with your perlite.

Hi simonas and welcome to flytrapcare!

As renesis stated, you want to re-pot right away if your plant is potted in John Innes no. 2 as it contains fertilizer which is like poison to the roots of your plants.

When repotting your plant, use a standard carnivorous plant soil mix of 1 part peat moss and 1 part perlite. It is now much harder to find perlite and peat moss that is not enriched but I know Lowe's sells unenriched Peat Moss or you can place an order with Steve D. @ http://www.flytrapranch.com. Peat moss is important because it adds acidity and retains moisture, while perlite provides drainage. Some growers like to mix in silica sand for drainage which is fine also. I would highly recommend trying different soil mixes to see what works best in your growing area. Just make sure that peat moss is at least 50% of the growing medium and does not contain any enrichments.

I hope this helps and please ask, should you have any more questions.

Giovanni

bugger!!!

I couldn;t find anything called just peat??

will i damage my plants if i wait over a day? would they be better if I took them out the soil for a day?

simonas wrote:bugger!!!

I couldn;t find anything called just peat??

It should be labeled sphagnum peat moss or just peat moss.

simonas wrote:will i damage my plants if i wait over a day? would they be better if I took them out the soil for a day?

Nah. I've had plants wrapped in sphagnum and wet paper towels for 3 weeks and they're fine when they finally get potted up. You could just put the plant in distilled water and let it soak for a day or two until you get some peat.

I'm assuming you are here in the UK, as I don't think they have B&Q's anywhere else. Anyway, I had a similiar problem trying to find peat moss too, but I eventually did find someone selling it here on e-bay, which could be your quickest option:


http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SPHAGNUM-PEAT-MOS ... 7C294%3A50

This is so strange...

In Belgium, even the smallest garden center has sphagnum peat moss.. You can't find Miracle Gro anywhere though, but who cares about that
Perlite is a bit more difficult to find, but i found a source now that sells 100L bags of perlite for €12.30..

Maybe the bogs in the UK are all harvested already?

Might be due to the UK peat laws as of late. They hit their target of 50% reduction in peat by 2005, and are aiming for 90% reduction by 2010.

Luckily there's this train called Eurostar