FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Redneck_Angel, although the roots are rotted and the leaves are dried out (?), if the "bulb" (the buried bases of the leaves) is not rotten, it can form new roots and new leaves, so you might want to plant it separately where you can ignore it most of the time but give it enough water to keep it moist, and it may grow again.

When you have a sick plant that has lost most or all of its roots to rot, one strategy, aside from immediately changing its watering schedule to emphasize moist, not wet, is to cut off some of the older, outer leaves of the rosette and just leave 2-3 of the leaves closest to the center of the crown, the newest leaves. This relieves the plant from having to hydrate too many leaves at one time (since it has few or no roots). Then you can place a clear bag (with some ventilation holes in it) over the whole plant and pot which helps to keep the leaves hydrated by increasing humidity and reducing drying air flow, and keep it out of direct sunlight, which would heat the interior of the bag too much and become a solar oven and cook the plant, so bright indirect light is best. This "hospital intensive care" environment can bring an almost dead plant back to life, given some patience and time.

Meanwhile, your new plant(s) will distract you so that you have something nice to look at and "play with" while your other plant slowly recovers.

Steve

Seriously Steve, you seem to be a wealth of information I am eternally grateful for. I will check for that, and try if it wasn't rotted, but as the center of the plant was all black (what made me decide it was actually toast) I'm not terribly sure there's anything not rotten left. The medium is still damp though- I didn't just toss it out, so I'll see what (if anything) I can do.

Redneck_Angel wrote:Seriously Steve, you seem to be a wealth of information I am eternally grateful for. I will check for that, and try if it wasn't rotted, but as the center of the plant was all black (what made me decide it was actually toast) I'm not terribly sure there's anything not rotten left. The medium is still damp though- I didn't just toss it out, so I'll see what (if anything) I can do.

Thanks for the compliment. If the center of the "bulb" is rotten, that is, if the active growing point is rotten, then that makes it a lot harder to revive, although if there is some unrotted tissue, it could (possibly) try to grow another root and leaf after all the rotted parts are trimmed off, the bulb rinsed and repotted. But if you think that the plant is too far gone, it may be better to just let it die all the way (if it has not already done so) and remember it as a learning experience (all of us have those, and many of us have killed plants from ignorance or inexperience).

So don't worry--Your next attempt will be much better.

I didn't realize but flowering of one of my typicals last year has actually killed the main plant. But there were so many divisions around it, it was hard to really notice. If there is some tissue there that's left and it gets the right conditions, it may come back. You can also just dump the thing in a zip lock with some soil and water, seal it, place it in a very bright place and let it heal like that. This way, you won't have to tend to it with constant watering.

I'm not sure if my Venus Flytrap is getting better. Heads are constantly rotting and the stems are still droopy. My mom suggested that I may be overwatering, so I've cut down by watering him only when his soil isn't moist.

pics?

^^ Sorry it took so long for me to respond.

I tried to take a few pictures of my Venus Flytrap, but they came out really blurry so you can't really tell what's going on. I've got my mom to take a look at the camera to see what's wrong with it, but no pictures until I can figure out how to fix the settings on it. Blasted, newfangled device. OTL

In the meanwhile, I'm happy to report that the Venus Flytrap is growing another trap that looks fairly green and healthy. I can only hope it stays fairly green and healthy.

maybe the camera isnt on macro. try pressing the flower.