FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

I recently got a drosera regia and I’m trying to find ways to help it grow better. Currently it is turning black at the tips and the sides are curling. There are only two leaves on the plant and one sprout. When I got the plant it had three healthy leaves and dewy. Last week it only had one leaf that was slowly turning black but I was able to get the two current leaves to grow so the roots didn’t die. The two new leaves were growing fine until a day ago. Only the open leaves are turning black, the sprout are untouched until they unfurl. One of my two current leaves has some dew on it but not a lot and the other leaf doesn’t even have any of the hairs to make dew. The hairs on the one plant are white but I heard they are supposed to turn red under proper lighting.

I try to feed it every two weeks with crushed freeze dried bloodworms. But I don’t think it has enough dew to digest it. When I feed it the all the leaves don’t wrap around the food like I heard the do. They just stay still. I’m getting maxsea fertilizer for my other sundews so I going to give it a try for my regia. Once I get the maxsea fertilizer I’m going to dilute it in distilled water and mist the air above the plant so I don’t spray off its dew. I will only fertilize the plant once a month until it gets a bit healthier to eat blood worms properly.

My apartment has dry air because I have a bearded dragon. I keep a dehumidifier constantly running so she doesn’t get sick. In order to keep tropical plants I had to get a 4 tier greenhouse self and added some modifications. I keep a humidifier on the second bottom self. the humidity never goes over 80% even at night, it typically sits around 70-80%.

For lighting I have my regia under a spider farmer sp1000 that has been dimmed. For the plant position I have it sitting on the second top self. The light is on for 12 hours with it turning on at 7am and turning off at 7pm.

Distilled water is used for watering, I don’t keep it in a water tray. I only water it when the medium is slightly dry. I don’t let the medium dry out completely so I water it like my nepenthes.

The medium my plant arrived in is live long sphagnum moss. I don’t know if I should change the medium to Kapecute Carnivorous Plant Soil Mix from Amazon. It’s 50% dried sphagnum moss and 50% perlite with no fertilizers added.

For ventilation I keep the zippers all the way up and the door is folded so it sits on second bottom self. A fan sitting is at the top pointing towards the zippers. I also installed a diy vent at the top with a vent grill but it might might another fan for more air flow. If I get another fan I’m going to have it on the bottom self underneath the humidifier point up.

The temperature is usually around 20c-22c during the day and 19c-21c at night. I’m trying to find way to drop the temperature more during night, but my ac is already at it lowest setting. I might have to move my ac closer to the self. But for now I have it sitting top of a closed tuber ware container filled with cold water and an ice pack to keep it cool. There has been times where the temperature has gone up to 24c during the day and I think it may have affected it.

If anyone has suggestions that would be great. My guess is that it hasn’t really been liking the heatwaves and the lighting might need to be adjusted a bit.

I grow my D. regia plants in a fairly well drained peat/perlite mixture, top watered until established.
When I get a new plant, I bag or dome it for about a month to reduce transpiration losses from the leaves.
I also give it very strong artificial light, synched to a latitude of about 35 degrees latitude with an astronomical timer.
This time of year, lights should be for about 14 hours, 15 minutes or so.
Just my 02¢ worth.

Thank you for the tip. I was thinking bagging it. I have a drosera adelea puplet that I bagged and now it has a lot of dew. Hopefully I will get the same affect with my D. Regia. I just put a bag over the top of the pot. I also adjusted the lights timer to be set for 14 hours. Crossing my fingers it will help it out.

There doesn't appear to be any tentacles growing on the leaf blade so it is definitely not happy. I know nothing about growing under lights so cant help you there, but mine I stand in water over the growing season and it gets quite warm during the day being in a suny unheated greenhouse in the UK and cooler at night obviously.

When you say you recently got it, how recently? They can sulk for a long while when acclimating to new conditions. Try keeping it wetter and giving it a temperature drop day to night if you can and don't try feeding it, feeding a poorly plant can lead to disaster.

Cheers
Steve

I have had the plant for about 25 days now. I did not bag it to acclimate it to my green house. I was also feeding the leggy leaves. I will try not to feed it for a bit until the leave bounce back and start producing dew again.