Carnivorous plant soil recommendations

I bought 100 lb from this place a number of years ago. They just shipped it on Purolator.

I just looked online for the local representative and phone them and said I wanted 2 bags of turface. When I told the guy it was for plant use, he said he'd heard it was used for that but had never come across a request. He said anybody that I knew who wanted some was supposed to give them a call because they were happy to sell it. And I think I just phoned into their head office and talk to accounting and gave my credit card number and that was that.

brettyoung.ca

Turface MVP - BrettYoung

Absorbs excess water to prevent muddy, torn-up turf Conditions the soil to resist compaction Adds permanent water and air-holding space to help strengthen turf grass plants and aid in turf recovery
brettyoung.ca brettyoung.ca
 
[EDIT @Stini beat me to it!] For those in the GTA - Kim's Nature sells most of the minerals needed for ping mixes - Calcinated Clay, pumice (coarse and fine), akadama, diatomaceous earth, kanuma, kiryuzuna, perlite, zeolite, vermiculite, etc.... they also have cheap sphagnum moss. For those in downtown Toronto, go to Grow It All for lava, zeolite and perlite. They have larger amounts for less $$.

I use a mix of 3 parts pumice to 1 part perlite, vermiculite, calcinated clay, akadama, lava rock and 1/2 part silica sand and zeolite. It's a complicated mix, roughly based on what Alex (Carnivorous Carnival on Instagram) uses. Been using it for about 6 months now and so far so good.
[another edit] I use this mix as top dressing now, with sphagnum moss on the bottom to wick up water. Got too expensive to fill the whole pot.
 
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stevebradford said:
Mixed up a few different soil mixes for Latin American Pinguicula

Turface 33%, Perlite 33%, Silica sand 33%
View attachment 28218

75% fine pumice with 25% silica sand
View attachment 28216

Diatomaceous earth 33%, Corse river sand 33%, Perlite 33%
View attachment 28217
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Unfortunately I gave a bunch away but here is the results of the leaf pullings on each different mix.

The ground pumice, left seemed to be the winner
IMG_5940.jpeg
 
Something like Fluval Stratnum might be similar to tuface? It is used in mixes for heliamphora as the plant grows on rock like cliffs. Lots of plant people use Stratnum instead of lechuza pon and some people swear by it for heliamphora. Stuff is used for aquariums and comes from japan volcanic areas. I believe only Fluval has rights to it.
 
Turface is a hard clay, and won't break easy. Fluval stratum will crush in your fingers. I use both in my ping mix, fluval for the moisture layer and turface for the top mineral layer. I have seen lots of good healthy Heliamphora grown in fluval stratum.
 
In fact, P. gigantea grows as it pleases, even on rock wool or glass wool alone.
Right now I even have one growing without substrate
'In situ', it grows on vertical limestone cliffs.

For the heliamphora, which I'm also familiar with, I just use blond peat.
They grow 'in situ' in a mixture of peat and sand.

According to aquarists, this type of Fluval Stratum substrate produces a lot of dust and algae.What do you think, those of you who use it?
 
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jeff said:
In fact, P. gigantea grows as it pleases, even on rock wool or glass wool alone.
Right now I even have one growing without substrate
'In situ', it grows on vertical limestone cliffs.

For the heliamphora, which I'm also familiar with, I just use blond peat.
They grow 'in situ' in a mixture of peat and sand.

According to aquarists, this type of Fluval Stratum substrate produces a lot of dust and algae.What do you think, those of you who use it?
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Stratum has tendency to form a crust with time thus lost the fluffy character. Also, moss grows quickly. No algae but moss.
 
Does anybody here have much experience with using a inorganic or inert growing media for their carnivorous plants?

I grow a few types of carnivorous plants on a small balcony (Droseras, VFTs, Sarracenias and Pinguiculas - but I also have a couple of Nepenthes), or in an indoor terrarium - and I find soil makes an absolute mess. (I'm also a bit of a klutz...).

When I first started, I did use peat moss and sand, in various combinations - but I found it incredibly messy and it got everywhere...

I then moved to dried sphagnum moss, sometimes with perlite mixed in - which seemed ok, although I think it was too waterlogged for some of the species, and also it does tend to rot after a few years. It was a bit less messy though.

Hence why I started looking for inert, or inorganic substrates - and settled on Fluval Stratum. It's a bit pricey here in Australia - but it's much less messy than getting peat moss or sand everywhere indoors. But it does tend to crumble a bit over time, or wash away, and I'm also worried about it leaching minerals into the water over time. (I did check with a TDS meter before - from memory, I think the water runoff was around 50 ppm. I water using RO water only).

I heard about people in EU using Seramis (https://diflora.it/product/seramis/), which seems like the holy grail for carnivorous plant substrates - however, it doesn't seem to be available either in the US/Canada, or in Australia.

Apparently Turface MVP is meant to be very similar to Seramis - however, I'm not sure if it leaches minerals readily into the water? Also, how is it in terms of water wicking action? Can you still use the tray method for watering?

I did read about Akadama, which is used by a lot of the Japanese bonsai growers. However, it's very expensive, and apparently also leaches minerals very easily, so is not very suitable for carnivorous plants.

There's also hydroponics mediums - e.g. LECA/Hydroton, although I don't know if they're suitable either?

Would love to know the inorganic recipes that people have tried successfully for the different genera :D .
 
There's no reason to have any medium, you can grow in a hydroponics setup. Medium is convenient as it is a low tech way to support the plants. Certainly LFS works for a lot of plants and lasts years. Mexipings do fine in mineral medium but that is messy if you spill it. Plants have an inherent messiness unless you grow in TC. I wonder about sealing pots with a porous cloth or something so the soil won't go everywhere. All sorts of possibilities, just limited by time and imagination. Many of my plants stay in the same medium for years with no mess or fuss, as long as I don't knock them over :p
 
I use pumice in various sizes along with silica sand and peat for almost everything I grow. I'll add it to anything without worries (rinsed first). 100% fine pumice for Mexipings, mostly fine pumice for temperate pings with maybe 10-20% peat for better wicking, 1/3 peat 1/3 silica sand 1/3 pumice for cephalotus, etc.
 
I've never used Seramis, but people really seem to love akadama and kanuma for nepenthes in particular. I've really only just started using it a few months ago so I can't tell you much about how it performs on a longer timescale, but I've been very happy with what I've seen so far. The moisture retention is excellent, and somehow it does it without making everything soggy. Also, the mineral leeching seems to be a feature rather than a bug; the nepenthes I've tried it with seem to, er, crave that mineral. But there's also some variability between nepenthes species in terms of what they want in a substrate, so maybe this wouldn't be ideal for all types. And I don't know how it would work for other types of carnivorous plants.

I've also heard good things about people growing in rockwool, but I'm a bit hesitant to try it out myself because I don't need to be inhaling tiny glass shards or wearing PPE while potting my plants.
 
Lloyd Gordon said:
There's no reason to have any medium, you can grow in a hydroponics setup. Medium is convenient as it is a low tech way to support the plants. Certainly LFS works for a lot of plants and lasts years. Mexipings do fine in mineral medium but that is messy if you spill it. Plants have an inherent messiness unless you grow in TC. I wonder about sealing pots with a porous cloth or something so the soil won't go everywhere. All sorts of possibilities, just limited by time and imagination. Many of my plants stay in the same medium for years with no mess or fuss, as long as I don't knock them over :p
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I would love to find a hydroponic setup that works for carnivorous plants =).

But it seems there's not a lot of people doing that long-term.
Smilodonichthys said:
I use pumice in various sizes along with silica sand and peat for almost everything I grow. I'll add it to anything without worries (rinsed first). 100% fine pumice for Mexipings, mostly fine pumice for temperate pings with maybe 10-20% peat for better wicking, 1/3 peat 1/3 silica sand 1/3 pumice for cephalotus, etc.
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Interesting! My understanding was that pumice isn't really inert, and will break down and leach minerals into the soil over time.

Is that why you rinse it first, to wash out any dust/fine particles? Or are pinguicular/cephalotus more tolerant of root nutrients?

spiffyzha said:
I've never used Seramis, but people really seem to love akadama and kanuma for nepenthes in particular. I've really only just started using it a few months ago so I can't tell you much about how it performs on a longer timescale, but I've been very happy with what I've seen so far. The moisture retention is excellent, and somehow it does it without making everything soggy. Also, the mineral leeching seems to be a feature rather than a bug; the nepenthes I've tried it with seem to, er, crave that mineral. But there's also some variability between nepenthes species in terms of what they want in a substrate, so maybe this wouldn't be ideal for all types. And I don't know how it would work for other types of carnivorous plants.
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Aha - I hadn't heard of people using Akadama for Nepenthese!

Do you know what mix they were using with them?

spiffyzha said:
I've also heard good things about people growing in rockwool, but I'm a bit hesitant to try it out myself because I don't need to be inhaling tiny glass shards or wearing PPE while potting my plants.
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I found an old Reddit post about rockwool and carnivorous plants (link, link), they mentioned it gets more waterlogged than sphagnum moss (i.e. too much so), and also has an alkaline pH (8.5).

I'm thinking I might try to get some Turface MVP locally to try out.

However, most people seem to be using Turface for growing Pinguicula - there's not a lot of information on using it for other types of carnivorous plants (e.g. Nepths, VFTs, Droseras).

Would you suggest trying 100% Turface for them, or what else would I mix it with? (I'm trying to avoid all the mess from peat moss/sand, in particular).
 
Oh - also - I found this really helpful article comparing growing mediums (like Seramis, Rockwool, Perlite, Vermiculate, Turface), and their water wicking, aeration, CEC values:


This forum post also had some info on CEC (basically if they will hold onto nutrients, and release them - I assume we want low CEC for carnivorous plants):

Cation exchange capacity and water retention rates list

I remember coming across some numbers from a bonsai magazine, I think, that had the CECs and water retention rates for different bonsai soil ingredients. Does anyone have this saved by chance?
www.bonsainut.com www.bonsainut.com
 
victorhooi said:
Aha - I hadn't heard of people using Akadama for Nepenthese!

Do you know what mix they were using with them?
Click to expand...

Well, based on the beginning of the thread I can see that John Yates uses Akadama 50% and perlite 50% for highland nepenthes in particular. That's a man who knows his neps, so I'd say it's a decent starting point.

For my (intermediate-highland) nepenthes, I tend to just throw in what I have available from a pool of (listed from least- to most water retention): red lava rock, perlite, akadama, treated coco chunks, LFS, and fluval stratum -- until I get the level of water retention and overall density that sort-of "feels right". I used to keep orchid bark heavily in that mix, but I've decided that I hate it, and I'm trying to move away from LFS too, mostly because I find its hydrophobic properties when completely dry to be super obnoxious, and it worsens as it ages.

I've not tried akadama on any lowland nepenthes or other carnivores, mostly because it's kind-of a pain to get my hands on, and I want to save it for the plants most likely to appreciate it.

This is sort-of nepenthes-centric, but I've found the write-ups from Cross Exotics, eg this one and this one, to be super helpful in terms of figuring out what different media even *does*.

victorhooi said:
Oh - also - I found this really helpful article comparing growing mediums (like Seramis, Rockwool, Perlite, Vermiculate, Turface), and their water wicking, aeration, CEC values:

Click to expand...

victorhooi said:
This forum post also had some info on CEC (basically if they will hold onto nutrients, and release them - I assume we want low CEC for carnivorous plants):

Cation exchange capacity and water retention rates list

I remember coming across some numbers from a bonsai magazine, I think, that had the CECs and water retention rates for different bonsai soil ingredients. Does anyone have this saved by chance?
www.bonsainut.com www.bonsainut.com
Click to expand...

Those links are really interesting. I will probably spend some time nerding out on this. :P
 
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