GREENHOUSE!!!

Boy it has been awhiiiiile since my last post. Lots of craziness going on in life. First and foremost was our move outside of San Francisco to Pacifica. Then came the whole unpacking thing and then the lousy economy and all this job uncertainty stuff. Blah. Well things have started to finally calm down here and...oh yeah...along the way I FINALLY GOT A GREENHOUSE!!! I LOVE IT!!! It's definitely not very big (only measures 6x8) but it finally gives me a place to grow my NEPENTHES (and one Heliamphora)!

Conservatory of Nepenthes...errr Flowers

As usual I'm about a month behind on my blog but better late than never, right? This post is about my visit to the Conservatory of Flowers here in San Francisco. I must say that I really love their little collection of Nepenthes. Enjoy!

Picture perfect

I love this one.

Cute lil' bugger. I think this might
be Nepenthes alata.

My Nepenthes truncata is about 1/50th this size...
needless to say it's got a ways to go!

ALBION!

I visited Albion a few weekends back and had a BLAST! It was the coolest thing to see these CPs naturalized into a pygmy forest. For a minute I forgot I was in California. This was also one of the first times I got to try out my NEW camera. Did a pretty good job even though I have yet to figure out the hundred or so different functions that it has. Unfortunately, I didn't bring the BIG memory card on this excursion (D'oh!) so I was very limited on how many photos I could take. I'm hoping these plants will still all be there the next time I visit this site. Sadly I doubt it because the Nature Conservancy are having these plants removed and donated. I understand why they are removing them but I'm still not too thrilled about it. Enjoy the carnie photos in all of their natural goodness!

When you're all grown up...

It's slow going with the tuberous sundews that I have been growing from seed. I manage to get over to my seedlings about once or twice a week. It looks like they get a teeny-tiny bit bigger everytime I see them. I'll admit though...it's gonna take a year or so before my Drosera menziesii looks like the photo of this one that I found online...

Little 'Dews

Just thought I'd share one of my successes with you. I grew a bunch of different kinds of sundews (mainly tuberous) from seed. I only got three different species of the sundews to actually come up. The one pictured below that came up is Drosera menziesii. The other two types of sundews that came up were Drosera peltata and D. capensis red. At this point the D. menziesii is the largest and, therefore, the best to photograph with my lil' camera. Now I have to keep my fingers crossed that they don't go dormant too soon and that they've developed enough of a tuber to come back for more next year!

Cute lil bugger, eh? It's about the diameter of a pea.

The Awakening...

SPRING HAS SPRUNG! The carnivores are coming out of their winter slumber! It's an exciting time of the year since a good number of my CPs went dormant during the wet season. Since this is the second season that I've had these plants they should come back even bigger and better this year. Here are some photos that I took from my various little "savage gardens" recently...

My Drosera binata is back and hungrier than ever.


This pitcher plant is going to bloom for the first time (I think)!


This D. dichotoma 'Giant' is rolling out the red carpet for the insects.



This Dionea 'Fang" is working OT to put out new
traps now that spring has arrived. I'm looking forward
to seeing the size of the traps it puts out this year!!!

Under Construction...

Well I finally got around to taking some pics of the new bog we just installed last weekend. It's only been a week so not a lot has changed. The 50/50 sand and peat mixture that the bog is composed of has begun to settle but the plants still look the same. I added a few more rescue plants from work to this SAVAGE GARDEN today (three sarracenia purp. hybrids and one miscellaneous sundew).

The Return of the BOG

I'm not talking about toilets here folks but an actual BOG that plants grow in. Not just any plants either...CARNIVOROUS PLANTS. This is my first little post (and it may well end up getting deleted) so stay tuned for more. Today (with the help of my assistant bogger) I set-up the ol' bog again...but this time in a new location. More on the way...