Question
Hi! I have a Drosera Spatulata from you guys, and it's flowering! Well, the other day I noticed that its flower stalks is sticky, and there's fungus gnats stuck to it. Are the flower stalks carnivorous too?!?!?!I thought it was a little odd. Also,the Drosera Spatulata has 30 or so flower buds on the stalk, but they never stay open! So far, I get 1-3 flowers a day that start to open, like maybe 2 petals are almost open, and 15 minutes later they're shut again! Before I thought it was that the light was too close to the buds, but I moved it up 2 inches, and they're still doing it. Is there something wrong, or is this natural? Will they still produce seed even if I don't pollinate them? The lighting is 4 foot flourescent on 14 hours a day,Temp. 70-80 degrees a scaucer of pure water that's 1/2 way up the pot with 1:1 Peat perlite.

Also, can you use the short, wiry roots on a Sarracenia for propagation like as root cuttings? The ones that hang from the rhizome. Does this method work well or not?
Thank you for your help!

Aslan

Answer
Hi Aslan,


Like the leaves, the flower stalk produces beads of nectar, but is not considered to be carnivorous.  Mostly its used to attract insects away from the leaves to the flowers for pollination.  The flower themselves don't stay open very long.  Even in our collection, we rarely see a fully open flower.  Despite that, we know the flowers are viable and self-pollinates because we usually find little seedlings coming up all over the greenhouse.

Sarracenia roots do not produce plantlets the same way Drosera roots do.  You have to break off a chunk of the rhizome to develop more plants.

Good growing!
Jacob Farin