The tops of my pitchers have started to turn black and die, I’ve had this plant for about 2 weeks, planted with spagnum moss and carnivorous soil mix, with holes on the plastic and distilled water in the pots. I also fed them freeze dried mealworms last week. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong?
Over feeding can cause pitchers to die off, but feeding them in general can often speed up their death. It’s okay to not feed them or only feed the pitcher when it’s already on its way out. However, as long as it’s getting about 30-40 watts 14 hours a day (they need a lot more light than we think), it’s most certainly a humidity problem. They really do need humidity to be over 50%, I suggest getting a cheap hygrometer and a personal humidifier for it. Make sure the temperature isn’t going below 60f and don’t let the media it’s in dry out. It is normal to lose pitchers when they change location/are transported. Your pitcher plant can live without pitchers. Remember not to ever fertilize. You can cut the tendril off all the way to the leaf once the pitcher is fully brown. It’s best to leave them on until then as it’s going to be taking nutrients from as long as it’s somewhat alive. Overall, up the light and humidity, cut the pitcher off when it’s all brown, don’t worry about feeding, use maybe half of a meal worm in one pitcher for a plant that size a month anything else is way overdoing it. If for some reason the liquid gets spilled out of the pitcher, add a tiny bit of distilled to it. And feel free to contact me @nepenthomancer on IG for any help or questions I do free diagnoses and advice on nepenthes there. Good luck!
5 Likes
I feed mine tropical fish food flakes and they do just fine. If they are given to much food the pitchers will die off. So wait a month before feeding again and start over. These pitches are pretty small so I would do the fish food and wait till they’re bigger to do meal worms. Also I would only do a half or quarter of one and dont give it to them frozen. It’s trial and error when learning carnivore plants so don’t worry. The plant still looks great.
2 Likes