Cut It Out

So, this weekend as I was checking on the plants, I found this baby. The pitcher looked good however, much more was going on than I really wanted.

Cut It Out
[Sarracenia ‘Wilkerson’s Red’ – OP]

So, my S. ‘Wilkerson’s Red’, OP (OP, by the way,  is just a shorthand for Open Pollinated as we don’t know who the pollen parent plant was) looked as if it was just fine — yeah, fine only for that one growpoint. I caught some fungus rhizome rot action going on below. This stuff is nasty and can spread, so it is important to deal with it as soon as it is noticed.  I began to notice this as I saw that some of the new pitchers that were coming up looked rather crappy and withered looking. Once I noticed it I knew I had to do some surgery.

This rhizome rot is caused by fungus, most common I believe is Botrytis.  You’ll see rhizomes turn mushy or brown and that’s stuff is just butt ugly and you do NOT want this crap in your collection.  Again, once you notice it, deal with it, ASAP as it can spread.

The below photo is a shot of the infected rhizome.

Cut It Out

Rhizome with the growpoint left is still good. Middle is crashing. The growpoint on the right is gone. This sucks, but I hope I did enough to save it in time.

I pulled this plant out ASAP from the collection.  So to deal with this problem, This is what I do:

-Separate the plant away from the rest of the collection
-Unpot
-Get rid and wash all old media off, dispose of accordingly (as it’s infected!)
-Cut away all crap rot infected areas
-Transplant the healthy stuff in fresh media and a fresh pot
-Quarantine the plant, monitor, let it grow back.

Cut It Out
[Time to do some surgery!]

So here we go. I unpot the plant by gently squeezing the pot which wil then allow me to slide the plant out.
Cut It Out

After I get the plant out of there, I *gently* took as much of the media off the roots as I could.  I then  *gently* washed the remaining media way from the root/rhizome in a bucket so that the water wouldn’t spread any infection anywhere else.  I dumped the water far away from any plant in the garden.

Cut It Out
[Getting rid of the nasty dirty media stuff]

So after getting rid of the planting media, here’s the base of the rhizome. I will keep the healthy rhizome on the left. The rest of this is pretty much gone.

Cut It Out

Next, I take sharp trimmers and carefully cut away.
*Important* It is very important to maintain good hygiene with your tools. Since I am dealing with an infected root, I made sure I cleaned that clipper. Rubbing alcohol works, or Lysol and some old rags are a few things you can use, for example. You could also let your clippers sit in an open flame for a while so that you can go brand your plants. (Just kiddin’…) but I think running the tools in an open flame should work though! (Anyone care to comment? I’d like to hear your feedback). I also hear using a 1-5 bleach solution and some old rags to wipe down the tools works as well.

Cut It Out
[Making the cut!]

After I made the cut, the infection in the rhizome was visible.  Healthy rhizome should be white, the nasty stuff is brown. The brown dead rhizome is what you want to get rid of.

Cut It Out
[NASTY!]

I cut far back into the healthy tissue to salvage the plant. Healthy tissue should look like the below.

Cut It Out
[Healthy stuff.]

And the bad stuff is below. Here’s the cross section of the infected and dead rhizome. EW! FUGLY!

Cut It Out
[Ew! It gots cooties!]

And the rhizome that I am going to salvage is small, kinda sorry looking but is my only hope right now for keeping a genetic representation of this plant.  Notice the stub-for-root on the right.  I’ve managed to save plants in worse condition that this though. I am hoping this plant pulls  through.

Cut It Out
[Hope.]

So, when rescuing the plant in this condition, I actually use long fiber sphagnum moss. The stuff below is what I pick up for a reasonable price at my local hardware store. I do NOT use that green moss, sheet moss, or forest moss that other stores carry.  Orchid moss (as it’s called on this packaging) is that blonde sphagnum moss. To me the stuff smells kinda rubbery when you first open the package.  It is typically dry when packaged up. So I grab a handful and let it soak in some water.

Cut It Out
[Da Moss!]

I then get a new pot, fill it PURE of this stuff, and then let it sit in a quarantine water tray full of water. I will make sure it’s always moist.  I plant the rhizome deep enough to make sure it’s snug , but yet not too far away from the surface of the pot.  I like this stuff because it’s light and breathable for the plant and root.  I’ve saved many a rhizome this way, and propagated plant rhizomes that break off in this way as well.

It’s important to use a new fresh pot as you don’t want your plant infected again.  If you were to use your old pot, I would suggest to sterilize it first by soaking in a 1:5 or 1:10 bleach solution.

Cut It Out
[Hope, transplanted]

I hear that some that people use at this point of slicing/transplanting would use something like a sulfur based fungicide to clean the rhizome, and to help prevent any of that fungi stuff from taking hold again.

For prevention, I have been hearing very good things about Trichoderma (beneficial fungi). I actually bought some of this beneficial fungus to fight off the nasties. I’ll only try it on some test plants to see if there’s any adverse affect, however I am being told by a couple fellow growers that the stuff works in prevention. Might was well try it… this is blog material for another post though.

I’ll continue to monitor the plant over the course of the year and watch for new growth. Sarracenia rhizomes can be tougher than what people give them credit for. Although there may not be much root on the surviving rhizome, I’m hopeful that it will survive.   I’ve even witnessed a Sarracenia growpoint that was broken off that was actually taking root in a water tray and the only thing it was growing in was some Utricularia!  (Utricularia is a genus of carnivorous plant. Some species are terrestrial, and some are aquatic.)  This broken off growpoint was growing in an aquatic mass of Utricularia…   Pretty amazing.
I’ll fill you in from time to time to keep you updated on how this baby will fare. I’m hopeful that it will send down more root and grow.

For now, all can do is watch, hope, and pray this baby gets better soon…

Cut It Out

Reptile Crossing Revisited

Hello fellow grower folks! With spring here, many pitchers are just exploding into growth. From the seedlings, I’m being constantly surprised with what’s coming forth.  Here’s an update on how these babies are doing from The Reptile.  For those of you who don’t know about Phil Faulisi’s S.’Reptilian Rose’ (a freekin’ rad hybrid), you can read up on it here.  I’ve first mentioned about the reptile crossings done by Dr. Travis Wyman in this post about 8 months ago in August, 2010.  The seedlings have gone dormant since then, had their pitchers trimmed back, and now that it’s growing season —  the pitchers are coming back with a vengeance.  There are still quite a few seedling plants sending out pitchers that I will update you on later once those have developed, but for now, this is the insanity that is going on.  Again, special thanks to Travis and Phil for their inspirational Sarracenia madness.

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x leucophylla "Purple Lips"
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x leucophylla “Purple Lips”

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x leucophylla "Purple Lips"
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x leucophylla “Purple Lips”

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

S. 'Reptilian Rose' x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava v. rubricorpora x leucophylla)

Pink Eye

So these past few days I’ve been having a battle with conjunctivitis. Or, more commonly known as pink eye. It really sucks having this. I’m currently on antibiotics and so far, 3 days in, I think it’s finally working.  Not am I only battling this conjunctivitis, but I also had some nasty eye infection that totally closed up my right eye.  I can open it now though. It could of been caused by a lot of things – allergic reaction to something, or playing in the garden with all that dirt flying everywhere (and landing in my eyeball). Or perhaps it could of been from boxing this weekend and injuring/scratching my eyelid or something  … eh who knows.  Don’t worry, I can’t infect you via blog posts.  Even my doctor said (and these were his exact words) “Don’t let anyone suck on your eyeball”.  Not sure what kind of medical humor that was but … uh… akward!!!

Anyway, as my fellow blogger and Sarracenia grower/breeder friend James from Lost in the Landscape had suggested to me recently, now would be a perfect time to show you my pink eye.

You wanna see my pink eye?

MY PINK EYE!

Sarracenia Pink Eye
Sarracenia “Pink Eye”

Now I got my pink eye from fellow Sarracenia Addict, Brooks Garcia. This photo is from September 2009. Sorry dudes, I can’t find anything more current right now, but this is the photo of S. “Pink Eye” that I was able to quickly locate to illustrate my present pink eye predicament. It’s still a young plant here as it was from a small division.  I really have hopes to multiply it so that I could spread the “pink eye” to fellow growers. Yes! GET INFECTED (with Sarracenia madness!!)  HA! 🙂

Photos: Behind the Scenes

So, I’ve had a few people ask me about how I photograph plants. My response is pretty simple. I just press the button. 🙂 HA!

Recently, fellow garden-plant-homie-dude Derek, who is the author of the wonderful plant blog Plantgasm (twitter: @Plantgasm) suggested I do a post on my set up.  This is actually a post that I’ve been wanting to do for a couple weeks, and thanks to his encouragement, I’m putting this up.

I gotta mention – below is what works for me.  I encourage you to try, experiment, learn, and just play around to see what works best for you! I would love to also hear about your photo experiences too. I have to also tell you that I am NOT a professional photographer.  Just a dude who likes to take a lot of pictures.

THE GEAR:


So, when I shoot, I use digital SLR (SLR = Single Lens Reflex) cameras, or DSLR’s for short.  I favor shooting with these types of camera because of the control and flexibility they provide for photography. I won’t bore you about all the details here, but you can always check out the wiki and the google and read up about DLSR’s for yourself.  I started out while back just using point and shoots.  On the left is my very first DSLR camera that I still do use from time to time. It’s a Canon XTi that I’ve had for a few years.  On the right is a Canon 7d.  Now: bear in mind it’s not the camera or brand that makes the shot. It’s really about who’s behind that view finder, capturing a vision, then conveying it in the  photo.  There’s always going to be debate on which brand is best, or which gear is best.  To me, it’s not about that but rather what the final product is. Some people think the more expensive the camera, the better the photo. Well, it’s not all about the “bling” factor of your gear.  Just use what you have! 🙂


Those rings above – are actually little macro lens adapters.  This allows me to get closer to my subject.  It’s a rather inexpensive way to get a nice close up photo without spending so much on a macro lens. It comes in varying powers that attach to your lens.  The higher the number, the closer you can get to your subject. You can combine them too.  Now, if you decide to go this route, make sure that the diameter of your lens matches up with the adapters.  For example, this is my 50 mm lens that I use a lot, and the diameter is 52mm.  Often times it’s reflected as the “Ø” symbol.   Depending how close I want to get, I’ll change it up from not using an adapter at all, to combining all of them.


Here’s a photo of the nifty 50mm with the +2 adapter on.

One of the things I really love about photography with these camera’s is being able to control the depth of field, or “DOF”.  This is that “background blurred out” effect you see .  For example, in the photo above of my lens, you see how the focus is on the adapter itself and how the rest of the photo is kind of blurred out?  That’s an example of a somewhat shallow depth of field.  You can control this by adjusting your f-stop on the camera. This is the number  you see next to the “f”.  Above photo was shot at f 4.  The lower the number, the shallower the depth of field.  The larger the number, the more foreground to background you can see.  For something more comprehensive that won’t bore you like I probably am doing,  here’s a pretty straightforward video.

ON TO THE SET!

Some folks have asked about the black background in the photos. So, what do I use?  I use various things actually that are solid black – one of which, is just poster board that I painted with black chalkboard paint The chalkboard paint was leftover from a co-workers building project. He asked if I wanted it and I figured out a good use for it!


I try to use something that has a matte type finish so that it minimizes the light reflection.   I’ve used things such as the black back of clipboard, to the flat black luggage inserts.  The board in the above photo needs some retouching though. I’ll probably repaint it this weekend or something.  Others I know use things like… black velvet, black cloth, landscape fabric… Hey, whatever works!

Oh, you see white piece of paper in the shot? That’s actually my reflector!  With some shots, I’ll hold the paper just outside the shot to reflect the light back onto the subject. It brightens it up a bit.

The time of day is important too.  Shooting when lighting is even is best. Morning, dusk, or cloudy days are great times to photograph because you won’t get that strong lighting and strong contrasting shadows.   A lot of times, I’ll take my photos during these periods.

Another thing I wanted to point out in my photo above is that this was mid day with the sun high.  This gave me some issues, but I’m still able to work around it.  When the lighting is even, I don’t have a problem with the background. When the lighting is strong, I have to angle the board away from the sun so that the black side is shaded. Otherwise if it’s facing the sun, or has excess light reflecting on it, I’ll have a grayish cast in the background.  I’ll still throw a few photos up this way, but I always feel lazy when I do. Ha!  Notice in the photo that I’ve angled the board away from the sun and just left it propped up so that the black side is shaded.

Next, I take the camera, and move in on the subject and frame the shot.  I composed both of the shots of this plant below with the main focus in the upper third of the frame.  Photo composure adds some visual interest to the photos.  For example, you can read about it here.  In the photos below,  I AM holding the paper outside the shot underneath the flower and pitcher to brighten it up a bit.  The photo below of the pitcher has a really bright hood just because it was shot mid day and the noon sun was blazing on it. I would of liked to shoot it in more even lighting, but I guess for illustrative purposes, the photos will do. 🙂

THE SHOTS:


Sarracenia hybrid


Sarracenia hybrid

I hope you all liked this little look behind the scenes – now get out there, grow something, and shoot it!

Derek, thanks again for your kind encouragement and prodding to post this process!

A Reptile Baby

 

Sarracenia 'Reptilian Rose' x  (flava var. rubricorpora x leucophylla)
[Sarracenia ‘Reptilian Rose’ x (flava var. rubricorpora x leucophylla)]

Howdy! I got home tonight while there was still a little light out (amazingly enough), and snapped this shot of an up and comping S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ hybrid. This is one of a few that are coming up right now.  This  is a seed grown plant and showing off some of it’s first pitchers of the season. The  pitcher on the left just opened, so has a bit of that pinched mouf’ thing going on.  The cross was created by Dr. Travis Wyman.  As you know, S. ‘Reptilian Rose’ truly is a stunning plant, and is one of my all time favorites, and was created by fellow Sarracenia dude-homie-bro, (and freekin’ Sarracenia Master), Phil Faulisi.

This seedling is just under 2 1/2 years old now (germinated in December, ’08) and as you can see, it’s showing some character now. I’ll update again in a bit once there’s more pitchers that are open. Check this out, for a look back  at some of the other seedlings just a about 8 months ago. My how the kids grow fast!

Lovely Luteola

 

Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa v. burkii f. luteola
[Sarracenia purpurea ssp. venosa v. burkii f. luteola]

Here’s the first open pitcher of this lovely  luteola this season. This plant was received a few years ago as a small seedling from Bob Ziemer.  (Thank you Bob!)  It’s been a joy to watch it grow year by year, and I hope to get it flowering next year.  More information on this plant here.  It has a couple more pitchers forming and I’ll take another photo when more pitchers are open.  Ah, looking quite lovely there, luteola.

Red + Green

Sarracenia leucophylla "red"  x purpurea ssp. purpurea AF
[Sarracenia leucophylla “red” x purpurea ssp. purpurea – AF, Cross created by Jerry Addington.]

This plant was sent to me as a seedling a couple years ago , created by good friend Jerry Addington.  The pollen parent, (S. purpurea ssp. purpurea – AF) is an anthocyanin free (AF) plant.  Even with one of the pollen parents devoid of pigment, the resulting progeny still has outstanding color and will color up even stronger as it gets deeper in the growing season.  And if you’re wondering – yeah, the back of the plant is the side that faces the sun the whole day, but eventually that color will wrap all around.  In conversations with Jerry, he speculates that the AF parentage in crosses (as in … with AF purps) lends itself to adding to a particular “glow” to the plant.  It’s something worth looking into for me – and being that there’s recessive AF genes in the mix, it should make for interesting breeding lines down the road.  RAD!

<a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/rco911/5566445660/” title=”Sarracenia leucophylla &quot;red&quot;  x purpurea ssp. purpurea AF by RCO911, on Flickr”><img src=”http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5013/5566445660_9bf276d667.jpg” width=”500″ height=”375″ alt=”Sarracenia leucophylla &quot;red&quot;  x purpurea ssp. purpurea AF” /></a>