09/29/2026
I apologize for not posting any photos or news, it's been a terrible summer. About two months ago, some of my Sarracenia species began to appear like they were going into dormancy. They had the usual brown spots that occur from feeding well, but this rapidly progressed to entire leaves turning brown. While it's normal for the pitchers produced in spring to look bad and die at this time of year, healthy plants should produce their best leaves in late summer. Mine weren't producing new leaves except for a very few plants. In a matter of days, the entire plant appeared to be dead. I couldn't find any pest or evidence of a pathogen that is visible to the unaided eye. Plant after plant died.
At first, I thought the extreme heat and very long extreme drought were the problem. I know in the southwest it is recommended to protect Sarracenia from afternoon sun. So I covered part of my bog area with a strip of shadecloth that protects the plants from mid-day to mid-afternoon. Some of the plants appeared to improve and produced several new leaves, but many did not.
Even one of my VFTs developed black traps, which is typical for going into dormancy. I was sickened and distressed.
As you may be aware, to legally sell live plants in Florida, a nursery certificate is required. Fortunately, the cost is just $35. Nurseries are subjected to an annual inspection, and my inspection occurred in spring, when my plants looked spectacular. I mention this because one of the perks of having the certificate is diagnostic assistance for plant diseases. I contacted my inspector and discussed my concerns. He quickly came out to my place and I gave him two affected pots of different species of Sarracenia and a sample of the affected VFT. He also took a sample from the bag of peat moss I've used for most of my plants, not just the carnivorous ones.
I received the results of the lab testing yesterday. No signs of pests or fungi were observed in the live plants. However, they showed signs of environmental stressors. The test of the peat moss sample showed it had very high soluble salts, much higher than is tolerated by native carnivorous plants.
The inspector asked if I had noticed an increase in birds or bats visiting my bog area. I can't say bats visit, but the bird activity has been intense. In fact, when crows began hanging out and damaging plants and removing plant labels, I put chicken wire over the top of my bog area.
What are soluble salts? There are many, including but not limited to sodium chloride, potassium chloride, sodium nitrate, ammonium chloride, and many more. Bird f***s do contain some soluble salts.
So, between the high soluble salts in the peat moss and the increase in bird visitation, my Sarracenia and Dionaea have suffered greatly.
I include the bird visits, because I have one Sarracenia that was given to me this spring by one of you, and it is affected too. This means my peat moss was not in the potting media of this plant, yet it is still showing the same clinical signs.
Yesterday, I started dumping tray water and replacing it with unused rainwater. I have a new bag of peat moss that I hope is free of soluble salts, and I'm going to repot the plants that appear dead. I'll wait to repot the still living species until they go into dormancy, though if they develop the same clinical signs, I'll go ahead and repot them.
If we had had normal rainy weather this year, it could have flushed out the soluble salts that wash out of the peat moss. Unfortunately, that hasn't happened, and I don't know if it will, so I have been very careful with my stored rainwater. If you look at the most recent drought monitor map of Florida, my area is still in extreme drought.
https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/CurrentMap/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?FL
Photos: Some show dead plants, some that are affected but still alive, and others that appear to be unaffected, and lab results.
