Question
Drosera Adelae
Hello again. I'm so sorry that I have been bothering you guys a lot. I have figured out how to send a picture or my Drosera Adelae. I am worried about the lower leaves and slight lack of dew. I have taken the 23 watt flourescent off of it completely because I heard from a friend that household CFLs kill plants. Is that true? The plant is still doing fine after 4 days w/o the CFL. I get 3-4 hours of morning sun if there are no clouds. The soil that came with it and now am using distilled water. I was using tap water before but I stopped just in case. Our water is from the South Umpqua river and it is treated here at our school. We are at Milo, OR. Thanks so musch!
AnswerHi Sterling,
Your plant looks totally normal. Older leaves will always look like that on D. adelae. As long as new leaves growing look dewy, you're fine.
Switching the water is a good idea. It might have been ok, but until you test it for total dissolved solids, you won't know for sure.
I'm not sure what your friend is basing the information on cfl's on. I've never heard that, and seen nothing that supports that. Common ones that are used in houses tend to be in the warm-white spectrum, which is a little on the red-orange side, and the "Daylight" bulbs are definitely better, which have more blue. However, I've never heard of them killing plants. No light will kill them for sure. All that being said, your window sounds just fine.
If you want to use artificial light, the best, most economical method is a two-tube "shoplight" fixture with 48", 40 watt cool-white fluorescent tubes. We discuss this at length in our volume #2 DVD.
Good Growing!
Jeff Dallas
Sarracenia Northwest
http://www.cobraplant.com
