Question

The entire plant  

What use to be the gro   Hi

My Nepenthes X Amazonias which I bought from you guys a few months back has all of the sudden lost all of it's leaf. What's even more strange is that the leaves died from the center of the plant from the old leaves to the growth point. When I notice that the stem and the where the leaves come out from turned brown and start feeling mushy, I immediately uproot the plant and discovered that the leaves (including the growth tip) was rotting away from the stem. I then pulled of all of the leaves and sprayed the entire plant with a sulfer base fungicide that you guys recommended, gave it new soil and pot and then bagged the pot. Now I'm just hoping for the best. And my question is, did I save my plant on time? Will the plant grow again from the roots or the main stem? Or should I take some root cuttings in case the plant does make it? Any tips to help keep the plant alive until it recovers?

Answer
Hi Ken,

I'm afraid your plant is very dead. :(  Once you see stem rot on a Nepenthes the roots are already gone.  We've lost a couple of these recently too.  Just based on what I've been seeing in our lowland truncatas, this seems to be a Nepenthes that likes being a bit on the drier side, and likes very consistent temperatures.  They seem to do better in a courser soil media, adding more course ingredients to the sphagnum to increase soil aeration.  Plants tend to do well in the summer when it's very warm and they are growing more rapidly, but can develop root rot easily when it's cooler in winter, and days are short.  Since all the parents in this hybrid are lowlanders, keeping the plant no cooler than 65, with warm days really seems to help prevent this.

Good Growing!

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