Venus Flytrap Dionaea muscipula

The Venus Flytrap is fascinating and much misunderstood. There is a lot of nonsense given as advice about growing and propagating these plants, so let's set the record straight.

Dionaea is a plant which never fails to fascinate, which could be its downfall: in the wild (southern United States, especially Carolina) it is critically endangered from overcollection. Growing from seed is simple but slow, with the added satisfaction that your plants have not been torn from their habitat. If the following points are borne in mind, Venus Fly Trap is actually one of the easiest of plants to grow.

• Use rainwater only. Venus Fly Trap is a bog plant and thrives with its roots kept wet. It derives its nutrients from its insect prey, and is so well adapted to this lifestyle that any extra nutrients - or indeed any chemicals, even naturally occuring ones such as the disolved carbonates in hard water - added to its water quickly result in death. Rainwater is easy to collect and in most areas is clean enough, but in inner cities there is a risk of it carrying pollutants. Dionised water (the sort sold for topping up car batteries) can be used for watering instead.
• Never set off the traps. Ever. Unless one is macabre enough to want to feed your traps live insects (and there's no need to - they're quite capable of catching what they need), it is better to leave them well alone. Trapping insects requires a lot of energy and if no insect is caught, the energy expenditure is wasted and the plant can soon deteriorate. The closed trap will remain closed for many days afterwards, denying the plant the opportunity to catch further prey, adding to its troubles.
• Let them flower. There is a widely held belief that the flowers should be removed as they will weaken the plant. This is simply not true A plant will not flower unless it is mature and strong enough to do so. We let ours flower every year and they continue to grow robustly. The added bonus of letting them flower is that they will set seed.
• They are quite hardy. In habitat they are frequently subject to frosts. However, they don't particularly enjoy conditions outdoors in Britain in the winter, but they will overwinter perfectly well in an unheated greenhouse or porch without any extra heat.
• Give them full sun. Although they will tolerate semi-shade, they fair far better for being exposed to full sun. The leaves grow much stouter and the traps colour up beautifully in full sunlight.
• You can water overhead. Some growers are strict about only giving their plants water by keeping their tray filled. In the wild, they are subject to frequent, very heavy downpours. These do not set off the traps; nor does the sprinkling from a watering can.
• Dead insects do not need to be removed. There is an opinion amongst enthusiasts that dead insects should be removed from traps after they have been digested to prevent the leaf from rotting. This is completely unnecessary. Like all plants, Dionaea continually renews its leaves: old ones die off, and new ones are produced to replace them. This process is not accelerated by insects decaying in the traps, and each leaf usually only lasts for an average of two trappings before it withers. Besides, dead insects are not removed from the traps in the wild.
• Only pot them in pure moss peat. This last point is the most controversial. The fact is, there's no substitute for it as far as Dionaea is concerned. Moss peat is what it grows in in its habitat. Many growers have tried all sorts of alternatives, but nothing has been found which gives the results peat does. Only very little is required as they are grown in very small pots, around 3" (7cms) for a mature plant.
• Grow in small pots See above.

All of the above may seem rather complicated, but suffice to say that if they are grown in small pots stood constantly in rain water, given full sun and the traps left well alone, they will thrive.

Sowing

Use a dwarf pot, about 5" (13cms) diameter and fill it with moss peat up to the rim, and 'strike off' the surface to leave it level. Press this down lightly with the base of another similar-sized pot to give a level sowing surface. Carefully distribute the seeds over the surface of the peat and then stand the pot in a saucer or tray of rainwater. Do not cover the seeds, or shade the pot. Leave it in full sun, preferrably in a greenhouse, and keep the water topped up. We recommend sowing quite late in the spring to take advantage of lengthening days and strong direct sun to encourage the seeds to germinate. They can take several months to emerge, during which time quite a thick growth of moss can appear. This should not be discouraged and indeed seems to provide the right sort of environment for the seedlings when they emerge.

The seedlings remain very wee their first year and only at the beginning of their third year should they be transplanted to individual 3" (7cms) pots. Plants can be carefully divided when they are large enough, at about five years old.