Question
Hi Jeff and Jacob

 It is fall and for the most part, my Sarracenia are putting up their best pitchers, except for my S. hammerhead, S rubra and S purpurea.

The hammerhead and the rubra are exhibiting deformed pichers that can best be described as looking like they are wrinkled.

The purpurea just seems to be failing. At the start of the season the pitchers looked healthy and the plant put up fourteen flower stalks. As the season progressed the plant seemed to deteriorate till the pitchers were faded in color and the plant looks like it is dieing. Of course a pitcure is worth a thousand words. You can see some here
http://s159.photobucket.com/albums/t131/selkie630/sick%20plants/


Nicole
90 miles north of NYC

Answer
Hi Nicole,

It looks like your plants got a serious case of aphids or thrips.  They usually attack young, supple growth.  As they suck out the tasty plant juices, they inadvertently damage the internal leaf structures.  So as the leaf matures and develops fully, they become deformed and disfigured.  Your plants are exhibiting classic signs of this type of pest damage.  

If you see this happening in early summer, spray your plants with Ortho?Systemic Insect Killer.  This will help prevent this type of problem happening to your fall foliage.  For now, there's nothing you can do but curse those aphids.  We're getting close to the first frost, and they will cease being an issue until next spring.

With your purpurea, did you trim off any of the leaves from the previous growing season?  It looks like you didn't, which is why you have a lot of brown leaves.  The purpurea leaves will last for about 18 months.  I generally start removing old leaves in early summer or when I start seeing new growth.  I start off by trimming of any leaves with significant amounts of browning.  As the season progresses, I then remove all of the older leaves.  This way by fall I have a really nice looking plant with only leaves from the current growing season.

So trim off the older leaves or any leaf that has a lot of browning.  The rule of thumb is to trim off any leaf when you can't stand looking at it anymore.  This will help new pitchers develop normally and not deformed or misshapen from being crowded out.

Good growing!
Jacob Farin