Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

I believe Athene from Penang once tried to start a thread on the basic cultivation info for each species. However, that thred died out. Perhaps I should put a "sticky" on it.

Perhaps we can continue in her thread and when I am free I will update the inforamtion into worksheet and upload into our archive under the "Nepenthes" page on archive.petpitcher.net. This document will be updated regularly by my when there is new info on the cultivation of the respective species.

How does that sound? Would need contributions from everyone or the data will not be accurate or complete.

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Glad you like the idea Cindy! :2thumbup: I just met an IT whiz guy at the Global Mala who, unbeknowst to anyone else, quietly assembled an entire 'Sustainable Koh Samui Forum' board using temporary 'place holders' for topics and sub topics! Don't know how long he has been silently working away at it before quietly unveiling it the day before the Mala! But it blew everybody away to see what he'd done!

I'm a bit too tied up in things right now, but when I get time I'll re-post the idea and see what kind of response we get. I saw some great work done by fellow forum members around the time of the petpitcher changeover so maybe we can do another collaborative effort and bring this together as well! As you said above, it would allow all of us to 'cut to the chase' without having to make so many mistakes from trial and error!

Whoops, while I was typing, I just saw David's later reply about this idea - Great! Let us know when you get free time for this! :biggrin:

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

It would be good if there is a format to follow. Otherwise we might get an essay to say that N. northiana does well in LFS and perlite, followed by another 20 essays on 20 other different species just because it works well for one particular grower.

Input needs to be substantiated and supported with growing experience (at least 1-2 years of growing the species) and not gleaned from the Internet or journals.

To give an example...

N. merrilliana
- grown in LFS/perlite for 2 years at the balcony (years the grower has the plant and where the plant was grown)
- produced pitchers sporadically and mostly during cooler and more humid weather therefore causing the assumption that the species perhaps prefers lower temperaures and higher humidity (description of the less than desired outcome)
- research suggests that it prefers a quick draining media and other growers who have made the change reported good results (reason for change)
- repotting into burnt earth caused consistent pitchering even during the hot and dry season (description of the positive outcome)

What do you all think? :smile:

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Sounds good! Maybe some kind of very easy to use system of check boxes for the data to make it faster and easier for people to use and then an area for text for further elaboration? Lets all brainstorm about the format before rushing to get something out there that we later don't find all that useful.:crying:

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Wow! This is becoming a very informative thread. I really like the idea of a database. Sounds like that would be a good project for everyone be involved with.

Cindy: haha:laugh:, I meant that I agree with you. I know there is no 'perfect mix,' only mixes that work well for certain species, in the conditions they are growing in.

Shawn, thanks for the info on your soil mix and the soil cubes. These soil blocks sound like they could really be useful in nepenthes mixes, and whats better, is, is that you don't just have to use clay soil or coconut fiber; You can use things like bark, or peat, or LFS. I think people may even start coming up with mixes for the cubes. :2thumbup:

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Well, I've ordered the plants. They should arrive in about a week.

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Cindy, I'm not sure, but there are floral foam being sold here that is quite different from styrofoam, the ones here are green and mushy to touch and absorbs quite a lot of water like a sponge, as opposed to styrofoam that doesn't absorb water. This is not to say that the floral foam is environmentally easy to dispose off though. :(

I love your ideas about the database. I am not an IT guy myself, but I imagine that maybe we can take some ideas off a Killifish website that I came across before. Not sure if this is the same one, but sure is similar:

http://www.bka.org.uk/BKA/SpeciesSea...Nothobranchius (just click on a name to see details)

http://www.bka.org.uk/BKA/SpecQuest.php?ID=477

This one is the interface on how people can contribute. Mind you however that it is like a "Poll". Which means that an expert's opinion versus say a novice's opinion will be weighted the same. A way around this is to allow comments from the contributors at the end of the database.

TTFN
Arvin

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Floral foam is used for flower arrangements right? :smile:

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

Yep Cindy, that's the stuff, green spongy when wet but a bit crystalline.

Arvinn - that's an interesting approach! Not a bad model at all. We'd have to come up with the question fields but that shouldn't be too hard. We could always add more as we find we need them.

Re: Nepenthes, and the Quest for the Perfect Soil
 

http://save-on-crafts.com/floralfoams.html
Cindy found some foam photos for you. The reason why I said they are not styrofoam, is coz they are green and they are porous compared to styrofoam like the ones that are used on take out food, etc.

The key Shawn is for us to find someone who can duplicate the same interface for us, plus find a home/server for us.

TTFN
Arvin