Is The Venus Flytrap Post Cute?

Your local gremlin with a Venus flytrap obsession. See a post that mentions Venus flytraps? Send it my way! I occasionally post about other carnivorous plants because they’re also cute, but Venus flytraps are my favourites.

[sadclowncentral]

seething about the fact that i will never experience photosynthesis in my own useless cells. i bet it feels so good when the light of the sun both warms you and fuels you at the same time. a bone-deep satisfaction mixed with a heated sugar-rush and endless brightness. not that i would fucking know

[galesong]

what do u think of when u think of north carolina?

location (eg blue ridge parkway, charlotte, outer banks, carowinds)

first in flight, wright brothers

college (eg duke, nc state, chapel hill)

celebrity, historical person from nc

someone u know personally from nc

food or drink (eg bbq, pepsi, cheerwine)

anti-trans bathroom bill

sports team (eg hornets, panthers)

animals or plants (eg cardinals, wolves, dogwood, venus flytraps)

home, ur from nc

something else

nothing at all, u stupid american

Voting ended onOct 26, 2024

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Okay everyone, poll’s over, but I know that we’re all thinking the same thing when you hear North Carolina, right?

Idk why I’m asking, of course you are. Let’s just all say it at the same time, k?…

VENUS FLYTRAP!!!

They’re only native to an area within a 75-90 mile radius of Wilmington, North Carolina!

[ihearthalflife]

can we see little fuck? please?

Little Fuck appears to have caught a fly!

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: CUTE!!

AWWWWW CONGRATS!! What a cutie.

[ratladysarah]

how to care for venus fly traps very very thorough info dump

LONG LONG LOOOONG text warning

general tips/care:

use ONLY distilled or rain water. use ONLY plastic, glazed terracotta, or glass pots. (PLEASE MAKE SURE THERE’S DRAINAGE HOLES)

PLEASE NO FERTILIZER 😢

the soil requirements are no nutrients in the soil, and make sure there’s good water retention and good drainage. Many people (including myself) use a mix of peat moss and perlite, in a ratio of 50/50. You can also use sphagnum moss.

a VFT can live in a small pot but they LOOOOVE taller, deeper pots, as they like to sink their roots down deep. This will probably help them do better as well.

as a general rule, you only have to repot every 2 years (one if you’re using sphagnum moss). Make sure to repot at the end of dormancy so that your plant suffers the smallest amount of repotting shock.

in the summer (75 degrees and up)

watering:

make sure your pot is sitting in a tray filled with water at all times. Again only use glass, plastic, or glazed terracotta for the tray as well.

They LOVE water, and are swamp plants. you should let it air out every once in a while though, to prevent root rot.

(I like to take them out of their tray once or twice a week in the evening and put them back in at around 10am. However you do it is up to your preference and judgment though. The sun kills a lot of fungus and bacteria but i like to play it safe.)

you keep it in a tray and should water the tray instead of the pot to prevent triggering the traps which suck up energy. The water level doesn’t matter all that much, though just make sure its at a level where the pot can suck uo water from the bottom, and not so much to where its getting waterlogged. sunlight: a vft should be getting 8+ hours of direct sunlight a day. if you live in an area where you can’t supply that, you can also use growlights (more talk on those later)

if your vft is a deep green, the leaves are thin, plant is small, and the traps are small, then its not getting enough sunlight. It depends on the cultivar, but most flytraps get redder in their trap with the better sunlight they get if your vft is yellow, or a really pale green, and the middle of the traps are really pale, and there’s brown or black spots on their leaves, you could be giving too much light (this is kinda hard to do though, without the help of a growlight.)

also if you live in a hot climate where you’re regularly getting 97f degrees and above, i suggest supplying a little shade mid day or growing them in a south facing windowsill with a growlight

fall (74-47 degrees F)

watering

Fill the tray with a little less water than you would in the summer. you should generally refill the tray 1-3 days after it empties completely.

if the weather is from 55-47 F though, i’d wait a week before watering and go even lower on the water level.

sunlight

they should be having around 7-4 hours of sunlight, but this just widely depends on what time of year it is for you. The beginning of fall they could still be getting full sun, but its best to start dwindling for dormancy.

winter (45 degrees f or lower)

Sunlight

Sunlight is not needed at all at this point. You could still let them get some sun but i wouldn’t mess with anything above 3 hours a day of direct light.

watering

So long as its the above posted tempersture, you really don’t have to water your vfts thst much at all. Only twice a month AT MOST and make sure thst water level is playing limbo with how low it is. root rot is probably going to be your biggest worry. Its cold so water is going to stay in soil for a LOOONG time, and your plant is dormant so it’s not going to be using much (if not any) either.

spring (same temps as fall)

Honestly do the same as fall just backwards. You might notice towards the rhizome, there is some salmon pink ish coloring, they tend to do that after dormancy as its natural sunscreen, its not a sunburn dw.

dormancy care

if you are in an area where you do not get an adequate winter, of stable temperatures of 45F or below for 2 months, i suggest putting the VFTS in the refrigerator.

I actually did this over the winter and had no issues, i just stuck the tray in the bottom of the fridge and checked on them every once in a while, but there’s videos on youtube on how to properly prep the VFTS for the fridge. if you’re in an area where you get REALLY low temperatures like in the 20s or below i suggest looking on reddit or youtube or something because i have no clue on what to do but i think they’re safe

you might notice a lot of the flytrap leaves start to die towards the end of the growing season, this is NORMAL and just part of the cycle. They will grow their traps much lower to the ground and closer together, this is just them prepping for dormancy.ALSO THEY GROW BACK WHEN THEY GO OUT OF DORMANCY YAYAYAY

A tip is to make sure you’re cutting off dead leaves with clean (small) scissors. They are decaying matter that holds a lot of water and can lead to root rot in the colder temps. (They aren’t that big of a deal in the warmer temps though, whether or not you trim them is up to you.)

BABY FLYTRAPS YAYAYAY

This honestly depends on the cultivarfor how fast thus happens, and whether or not the plant is mature, but you might notice REALLY tiny baby fkytraps at the base of your adult fkytrap. CONGRATULATIONS 🎉 🎉🎉 YOU HAVE A BABY WOOO WOOP!!!

In all seriousness though, VFTs reproduce in 2 ways. From seed or something similar to mitosis. If a tiny fkytrao is growing at the base thats the mitosis ish thing.

basically a healthy flytrap will start to grow another flytrap at it’s rhizome. This is a separate flytrap and you could keep it there or separate it in its own pot. I suggest waiting a little to let it mature a little before separating. in the spring you might notice a stem start to grow instead of a trap. This is a flower stalk

whether or not you cut it off is up to you but be warned flowering takes a lot of energy, and if your vft is weaker or you just want to focus on growing, it s probably best to cut it off. The flower stalk is also how you get seeds. A vft flower needs to be pollinated from another vft ‘s flower, and they have to get pollinated in order for seeds to be harvested. A vft will usually make 3-10 flowers, in which they each bloom for about a day or two and then the next one opens up.

also be warned vft seeds take a LOOONG time and require a lot of humidity and patience, but possible to germinate. Vfts are VERY slow growers when they first start out so just know growing from seed might not be the best option if you’re really exited about owning a flytrap for the first time.

THE ULTIMATE QUESTION 😱😱😱

Can you stick your finger in the trap? YES

it will not hurt your finger at all. It’ll feel a little wet but it feels really nice, like your plant is holding your hand. The trap closes when you touch two trigger hairs within 20 seconds

HOWEVER

triggering a flytrap to close takes up a good amount of energy.

when you first get your flytrap you can put your finger in the traps a couole of times but i’d only do it once a month per trap afterwards because it really isn’t good for the plant.

If it is a false trigger, usually the trap will open back up throughout the course of a day.

if a flytrap is digesting a meal, it will usually open back up within a week or a coupke of weeks, this just depends.

also really cool thing: after it opens back up, it leaves the exoskeleton of the bug and they’re fun to look at.

also note: YOU DO NOT HAVE TO FEED YOUR VFT 🎉🎉🎉🎉 you can if you want to but honestly i wouldnt do it more thwn twice a month because they dont need bugs *THAT* much in the first place

these are some random diagrams that gets you more familiar with flytrap anatomy (SURPRISINGLY COMPLICATED!?!?!???) i just found these at the top results of a google image search lmao

also other stuff

WHY ARE FLYTRAPS SO PARTICULAR (DO NOT DO THESE THINGS PLEASEEEE)

they HATE nutrients. the minerals in normal water burn their roots, and pots made of terracotta, wood, metal, etc will leach in nutrients which will slowly kill your plant. (Though normal water is a FAST killer.)

Also dont feed them human food. Too much salt/ some form of thing that flytrsos would get poisoned by. Just stick to them catching their own bugs and they’ll be fine.

origin story

vfts (as well as a lot of carnivorous plants) come from parts of the carolinas in the usa, where its swampy and is constantly rained out. This causes all the nutrients to be washed away from the land, so the whole reason they are carnivorous is because they get their nutrients from eating bugs instead of absorbing nutrients from their roots.

FINAL NOTE:

This is a ton of information, and yes they are quite picky.

HOWEVER

so long as you supply their basic needs, venus flytraps are incredibly hardy. Its actually surprisingly hard to kill one so long as you know how to take care of them

they’re also surprisingly low maintenance once you get everything established

you might have to do to some work at the beginning and end of the growing seaosn but its not much. For most of the year you can just have them in a spot outside (with the right amount of sun) and refill the water when it needs it. I’d say it’s difficult obtaining the water *sometimes* but once you get in a groove (and collect rain water) it gets really easy. they’re certainly the most fun plants to grow out of all the ones i have, and they’re actually the plants i started out with when j first tried gardening. i also do suggest these for beginners because THEYRE SO FUN and with how hardy they are its really nice.

as far as cultivars go, as a first time grower i suggest just the standard upright grower flytrap, but if you have a disposable income, you can buy the DC-XL flytrap. (You can buy them online here) #notsponsored. The DC-XL is the hardiest flytrap cultivar in the world and can grow really big. I actually managed to get my hands on one. Its a baby right now but uts going to get BIGG as an adult.

i think that’s enough yapping but if you’re passionate about wanting flytraps i also suggest research on youtube and also various forums on what other people have to say. Its really fun to learn about

🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛

@velvetring1

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

This is lovely!!

Quick note on the dormancy, since I’m from an area with cold winters: flytraps don’t like to freeze. They can tolerate a bit of frost for a short period of time, but it’s usually best to avoid it.

So, if your winters are usually colder than 0°C or 32°F, the fridge method is a great option!

If your flytraps are in full sun, be careful with black plastic pots, since they can get very warm very quickly. This becomes a problem as the plant dries out. Lighter colours are a better.

[ratladysarah]

Looove how red they are yaye

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: cute!

Woahhhhh! These are gorgeous!! :D

[ratladysarah]

Love it when flytraps leave the exoskeleton after its finished digesting its bugs. It reminds me of when a cat in a cartoon eats a fish whole and pulls out the skeleton between their teeth

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: CUTE!

It’s so fun!!! It’s like your flytrap is showing you what a good job it did eating its food!

I just fed mine a very tiny garden snail, so that’ll leave a cool shell behind, if it can digest the snail!

[ratladysarah]

YAY THANK YOU

hehe i hope your flytrap finds the snail tasty

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

:D

It seems to be liking it so far!! I’ll try to update when/if it finishes digesting

[prince-liest]

Expanded my pinguicula collection! I'm extra excited for the gigantea; I've seen people grow them to be the size of their head!

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

These are so cool! I’ve been trying to get my gigantea to grow that big for about a year now, and I’m not sure how people do it. Also, what’s the ping with the lovely white flowers?

[prince-liest]

I've been told that giganteas tend to get bigger with lower lighting, since it encourages them to create broader leaves to catch more light! It's why I set mine at the far edge of the display, def the area that gets the least amount of light. Will see how it goes!

And the yellow/white flowers are actually also from a Razzberry Blonde! Hard to see from this angle, but it also has the pink veining. All three of the pings in that top row plus the one similar ping directly underneath are splits off my original Razzberry Blonde. It's suuuper prolific, and I've even given away a few already, hahaha.

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Woah that’s so interesting! I’ll have to give that a try with my gigantea!

[the-dust-walkers]

If your Venus flytrap starts flowering, you can actually cut the flower stalk off to help the plant focus its energy on vegetative growth instead. (Translation: more traps, happier little murder plant.)

Flowering takes a ton out of them, especially if they’re already dealing with less-than-ideal growing conditions. In weaker plants, blooming can stress them hard enough that recovery becomes difficult and sometimes fatal.

The flower stalk doesn’t have to go to waste though. Once cut, you can use it for propagation! (Please do the needed research,these plants can be very touchy and propagation is more than just plopping the flower stalk into some water.)

Also, please respect their Winter dormancy period, this keeps them in sync with the seasons and also benefits their health. They need their sleep,just like you. ♥

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: CUTE!!

These are all SUPER AMAZING POINTS!

Also I know no one likes the effort of winter dormancy but pleaseeeeee still do it! You’re inevitably slowly killing your flytrap if you don’t give it a dormancy!

🥺 pls give your flytraps a winter dormancy

[ratladysarah]

Idk how to explain it but whenever it rains i go 🤑🤑🤑💰💰💸💸 because i got a bunch of plastic buckets outside to collect rain water bc that means i dont habe to pay for distilled water or distill water myself for my venus flytraps

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Same!! And at least with the amount of rain I get, I probably am never saving more than 1$ for an entire day of rain, but you know. It’s free. Why not.

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

re: asking where to get clothes with carnivorous plants: California Carnivores has quite a few cute options. Given your blog, highly recommend the “don’t tease my traps” one. NCBG has an informative shirt on native ones. It’s heavy cotton and seems like it’ll last a long time. A lot of the others tend to be from nurseries or growers. Carnivero has some and I think other bigger nurseries have had ‘em in the past (but maybe not now?). Some growers on insta have branched out into merch. The only one I’ve bought stuff from seems to have deactivated, so can’t give any recs on that front.

Oh COOL! Thank you!

[ilhamiman]

Venus flytrap inspired alien. After watching an artist I follow in YouTube drew his own take on Venus flytrap as humanoid female, I got inspired. So here she is. Enjoy. Oh yeah, I think I used a colour palette I find in Tumblr.

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Flytrap SKIRT? Oh I love this idea. Could you imagine a flytrap ballgown? That would be so fun

[ratladysarah]

Love it when flytraps leave the exoskeleton after its finished digesting its bugs. It reminds me of when a cat in a cartoon eats a fish whole and pulls out the skeleton between their teeth

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: CUTE!

It’s so fun!!! It’s like your flytrap is showing you what a good job it did eating its food!

I just fed mine a very tiny garden snail, so that’ll leave a cool shell behind, if it can digest the snail!

[prince-liest]

Expanded my pinguicula collection! I'm extra excited for the gigantea; I've seen people grow them to be the size of their head!

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

These are so cool! I’ve been trying to get my gigantea to grow that big for about a year now, and I’m not sure how people do it. Also, what’s the ping with the lovely white flowers?

[haunteddollsgeorg]

Testing out some carnivorous plant ideas for fall. First go at a Venus fly trap

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: cute!

You can tell that this ceramic flytrap is healthy because it’s got red on the outside of its teeth! This only happens when they are getting enough sunlight.

[one-ugly-fucker]

My parents bought me some carnivorous plants and they're so cool and I'm so attached to them already but they're SO FRAGILE IM SO SCARED ILL KILL THEM

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

YOU’VE GOT THIS I BELIEVE IN YOU!!

[champagnesupernoel]

We named our new plant Hydra 🌱

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Rating: woahhhhhh (cute)

Also, a whole store of carnivorous plants? Amazing. I wish I could visit one someday, since they don’t exist in my area.

[champagnesupernoel]

i love that my plant is officially rate cute ! so neat ! i love gimmick blogs lol <3 and yeah it's a whole store dedicated to them! they also had pitcher plants for sale, which are an eventual type i'd like. they had a few more common 'house' plants as well, but they specialize in carnivorous ones.

the clerk gave me a lot of water tips for our lil guy. since posting this, i've been DIY making distilled water. our plant is small but is growing faster than i would've thought, and eventually we want to upgrade their pot to something bigger with a proper saucer dish. but for rn they're still in this set up, but being kept outdoors with our other plants.

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

That’s so cool!! I love that they were able to give you a bunch of tips, since getting started is usually the hardest part with carnivorous plants!

Also, distilling your own water is super cool and so impressive since (from what I hear) the equipment can be a bit finicky. How long does it usually take with your setup?

[champagnesupernoel]

It's both easier than I initially thought but still kinda time consuming. I kind of just leave it and walk away though lol.

This is my set up. Inside the pot is a bowl collecting the condensed water. The water inside the big pot is boiling, then the steam rises to his the lid topped with ice, and drips into the inside smaller bowl.

I don't leave it as long as I probably could but I get about 3/4 - 1 cups worth. However my pot is pretty big so it can fit a lot of water. I have a glass jar I put it in when it's done. The lil guy is growing fast and I rewater a couple times a week when the water is gone/low. If I had a way to collect rain water I'd be doing that.

My plant has gotten bigger since this post we need to get it a new pot and proper saucer lol.

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

Woah, that’s such a smart setup!

[floraleevee]

i don’t think I talk much on here about just how obsessed I am with carnivorous plants. Frankly, the people in my life seem to simply tolerate it so I’ve just gotten used to being known as “the carnivorous plant guy” without ever actually talking about it much in person any more. So in my day to day life I feel like I don’t really give off “this is an obsession that’s been building for close to a decade” vibes. But sometimes I take a step back and realize 90% of my apartment’s decorations are centered around carnivorous plants, I’ve got something like a dozen books on ‘em on display with several of those being textbooks, have carnivorous plant jewelry, carnivorous plant outfits, carnivorous plant bags, and I have a literal (cheap and shitty plastic) greenhouse as well as two terrariums that all grow only carnivores. Hmmm…perhaps I’m not as subtle as I think I am.

[floraleevee]

Going into my drafts and this is an excerpt from the first one that pops up. Maybe I do talk about carnivorous plants here with some regularity.

[is-the-venus-flytrap-post-cute]

SARRACENIA PURPUREA PITCHERS DONT DIE OVER WINTER?? WHAT??