Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Sorry this will be a bit Pessemistic, but I am not too sure about pure inorganic potting medium.. :( If the main purpose is to find alternative to SM and PM, you guys have already mentioned cocopeat and cocochips which is far more sustainable. If I may report.

1. Almost (emphasis there) all nepenthes keepers in Manila/Philippines are using cocopeat and cocochips, with some actually using coco products and other mixes, even clay.

2. I am not too sure about the decomposition yet, maybe I am not good at confirming if my coco mix has decomposed already or not, but I think that some kind of inorganic mixed with it will help a lot.

I myself will buy some more clay balls to mix with coco products in the future.

Lastly, I have had problems with some well drained mixes before, where they easily dry up and kill the plant, so even with cocochips, I do use a very shallow water tray (I know some do not recommend this for neps, but what can I do, either that, or water twice a day, or dead dried neps) :(

Very interesting topic! Looking forward to results!

TTFN
Arvin

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Thanks for your thoughts Arvin. No worries on being pessemistic. All ideas and thoughts are welcome here and on the forum. This is where we learn from each other. :1thumbup: Good thoughts Arvin.

Yes, I agree with you that coconut peat and coconut chips are already proven to work, but what I want to experiment here is to use clay pellets with polysterine and perhaps with sponge as well.

I am asking members here to try and experiment on these as media and think of ways how to lock in the moisture so that the plant do not dry out. It would be great if this can work as we may never need to repot or change the media for a long, long time as these media do not decompose and do not compress over time.

Perhaps what we can do is to place a deeper saucer of water under the pots or perhaps still use some sphagnum moss but just a thin layer on top of the media to lock in the moisture. Just some ideas off my head. I am sure members would be more creative than me and hopefully we can find a way to do this.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

You know this topic is leading into the field of hydroponic. Basically hydroponic is soiless horticulture where the nutrition is supplied through the water. Since CP don't need little or none fertilzer via roots any well drained mixture would do. All the medium does is give the roots to hold on and keep plant upright.
Slightly off topic, I had a colony of pgymy (Lake Badgerup) growing in silica carbonate for several years.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Arvin, I agreed with you on the coco media. 100% inorganic media can be use depending on the "species". For example, N. northiana, N. campanulata, N. boschiana and etc can grown nicely with 100% inorganic media. For other species, I think up to 70%-80% of inorganic media shouldn't be any problem as long as it won't compact and harden after a while(this is why it's better to mix different types and sizes of media). Everyone have their own preferred mix formula since the growing condition for everyone of us will be different.

From my experience, the problem with coco chips/peats being drying out too fast is because unlike other organic media, these media will take a while to properly rehydrated once it's completely dry out. In order to avoid this problem, you have to maintain a constant watering regime to keep the media moist, once it's moist, it'll usually take 2-3 days before it'll completely dry out again in tropical L/L condition without any watering.

Another good and cheap inorganic media would be pumice stone. If not mistaken, I think Shawn use a lot of it with his CPs.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Well it crumbles easily you can actually use your hand to divide it into smaller
pieces, tho i still use a hammer to smash them into smaller pieces. once set
they don't deteriorate at all, although i noticed that the top layer of it
becomes a haven for algae. And the first time you soak them in water you
can actually hear them sizzle as they absort water. I have no idea of the minerals
whether they can be good for neps or not.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Would be great if you can try this out on one pot of Nepenthes and let us know? That's good news if they do not deteriorate at all. These are the types of media I want to find out if it can be use.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Of course, problem is that I dont have any neps that i am willing to try this
on at the moment. I do however have 2 ventricosa's that are not doing well
so i dont think it'll be good to try it there. Give me a few weeks and i'll buy
some cheap alatas to try on diatomite.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

Can replace peat moss with cocopeat and Sphagnum moss with Cocochips like what Roberts said.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

yep, coco peat and coco chips are what my mix is made up of. with some
coarse charcoal.

Re: Inorganic media for Nepenthes
 

It is used for aquaristic filtering and often also used by Koi breeders for there filter systems. I found some 20 litres bags for about 30 US$ here in germany. As it is strongly absorbing ammonia and salts it should even work as filter material in the medium. It doesn't release any of the absorbed things but nevertheless it is "rechargable". But that I haven't looked yet how this works. Didn't ordered yet. Just wanted to see that there is maybe already some experience.