Questioni have my first Dana delight plant in california i keep the soil wet at all times constant sunlight but it refuses to grow what should i do i re planted it in perlite and peat moss covering the whole thing with soil it now has been a week and nothing coming out of the dirt what do you recommend.
thank you for taking time from your day to help me.
AnswerI'm assuming you got your plant bare root since you needed to pot it. Depending on where you got the rhizome from, it may have been dormant when it left the nursery. Some parts of the country have experienced a late start to spring. This is particularly true for folks in the Pacific Northwest.
If this is the case, you will need to be patient. Sarracenia takes time to emerge from dormancy. They also grow slower than other plants, such as roses or day lilies. Expecting new growth after only a week is very unrealistic expectations for Sarracenia. Some plants may produce only one leaf/pitcher per month! With our Daina's Delight, we have yet to see any new growth. Given our recent weather patterns, we may not see our first open pitcher on this plant until early June. So you will need to be patient.
I'm also concerned about your potting technique. You mentioned that the covered the whole thing with soil. The plant should be covered completely. A rhizome is like a stem that grows along the ground. The upper portion and the growing tip of the rhizome should be above the soil line. You can see examples of how we pot up our rhizomes in this month's video podcast. If your plant doesn't look like ours, you may need to repot your plant. It's still very early in the growing season, so having to repot it will not affect your plant at all.
http://www.cobraplant.com/videos
For more information on growing Sarracenia, watch Grow Carnivorous Plants, Volume 1 DVD.
http://www.cobraplant.com/DVD