Question
Hi Jacob . I have been reading The savage Garden love it,anyhow in the book it talks about Maxsea 16-16-16 diluted to have the recommended dose,to help a little bit on the growing of younger carnivorous  plants,it stated that it helps with the longer going periods of a younger plants that might take 5 years to mature,to mature a little faster than normal like kinda half the time it takes to grow to adults.just would like to know it if that's true , and your personal opinion about it .
        Thank you love you guys.  Robert Galvin.

Answer
Hi Robert,

The Savage Garden is still the best single book out there on carnivorous plant cultivation, and I still refer back to Peter's information from time to time.  Areas that we might have of disagreement are going to be minor, and this topic isn't one of them.

Fertilization definitely helps young plants.  Sarracenia benefit the most with flytraps a close second.  The saying weekly and weakly is super true.  You don't want to overdue it or you'll kill plants.  It's one of the reasons we don't recommend fertilizer to new growers until they understand the basics of how these plants grow.  It's just too easy to mess it up, and some plants just grow at their own sweet pace such as Cephalotus.

As far as types of fertilizer, there's nothing magical about Maxsea.  It's a basic chemical N-P-K fertilizer with seaweed powder added for trace minerals.  We've used it, but not found it superior to good quality orchid fertilizers.  It is helpful to find a fertilizer without urea so that it rinses out of media quickly.  Maxea is fine, but so are many other fertilizers.  Just don't use too much!

Here's another great option for Sarracenia seedlings:  http://www.carnivorousplants.org/howto/Feeding/SarraceniaFertilization.php  We've done this and it works well.  Some species and hybrids respond faster than others, however.

Good Growing!

Jeff Dallas
Sarracenia Northwest
http://www.growcarnivorousplants.com