Carnivorous Plants - Nepenthes Stem Cutting Propagation

[@kozlinda]

excellent tutorial and i'll remember the technique in about 10 years when my tiny baby beginner Neps are big enough to offer cuttings. 😂

[@brendagomez6506]

Can’t wait to try this

[@marie-joseelanglois1333]

I put mine in perlite in small propagated box with light and it worked very good and very fast to grow

[@davidb5255]

Do you heat the propagator? During the summer I put my cutting in perlite in pots in a propagator in indirect sun in the greenhouse. In winter sometimes I just have them in a tray on a windowsill, not even bagged for additional humidity. Our house is not the warmest so I have wondered whether bottom heating would help speed up rooting. They do still mostly root but it can take a while. I potted up only yesterday some cutting taken in June this year, some had masses of roots others not so many, all had good strong growths though.

[@greenmachinesweden]

Great vid! New subscriber, I am going to enjoy this channel.

[@davidb5255]

Awesome, thank you!

[@davideickhoff2954]

Have you ever tried vermiculite for cuttings?

[@davidb5255]

@@davideickhoff2954 no I've never used vermiculite in either adult carnivorous plant compost mix or in seedling or rooting mix. My only experience with vermiculite, which has coloured my view of it, was way back when I was a teanager at home with my parents and I found a bag of it in the shed which had been wet for a bit and just turned into this brown sludge. That's put me off it since it does degrade over time, where as perlite does not and so maintains it's ability to help lighten and aerate the compost keeping it open and free draining. That is good for sarracenia compost but more important for nepenthes given they like damp but not wet roots.

[@codetv9062]

Do upper cuttings form lower pitchers?

[@davidb5255]

As far as I can tell yes, albeit the Nepenthes I tend to do this on don't have a massive difference in lower and upper pitcher characteristics other than the lower ones are usually a bit smaller. I've seen comments that suggest the lower vs upper pitcher difference is to do with the prey they might attract, the lower ones maybe taking more crawling insects than upper. If that's true then I would guess the biology which triggers the change is controlled by chemicals which vary with the distance from the roots. Therefore once rooted a cutting taken from the top will produce the same pitchers as one from the bottom of a vine.

[@ThePretendJudge]

Perlite is cheaper. I use 2 parts spaghnum 1 part perlite and it works as a medium so I never need to untangle roots ❤

[@davidb5255]

That will probably work as well. I don't have a ready supply of spaghnum but I have plenty of perlite for general potting mix. I buy it by the 100 litre bag I get through so much.

[@ThePretendJudge]

@@davidb5255 it's all inert so it shouldn't be a big matter. I was just saying if you mix sphag w perlite it's easier to untangle roots and stretched the spahg. You can dry out your sphagnum and keep it to reuse. To expesive to keep buying it imo