Growing Carnivorous Plants

[00:00:00] John Moore: Ever wonder what it takes to grow and care for carnivorous plants? It’s probably less daunting than you think. In this episode, we’re talking with Jacob Soule all about successfully jumping into carnivorous plant care. This is Mother Earth News.

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Intriguing Plants with Jacob Soule

[00:01:20] Kenny Coogan: Good day everyone, and we appreciate you for joining us on another exciting Mother Earth News and Friends podcast.

[00:01:28] I am Kenny Coogan, and joining me today is Jacob Soule, the plant prodigy. At Mother Earth News for 50 years and counting, we have been dedicated to conserving our planet’s natural resources while helping you conserve your financial resources. Today we are going to learn about carnivorous plants and how to grow them.

[00:01:50] Jacob Soule has been growing carnivorous plants for about six years. His passion and expertise for carnivorous plants was heightened through his [00:02:00] autism, which allowed him to hyper-fixate on these intriguing plants. He is currently a student at Western Michigan University studying environmental sustainability and is growing a countless number of carnivorous plants.

[00:02:15] Welcome to the podcast, Jacob.

[00:02:18] Jacob Soule: Thank you.

[00:02:19] Kenny Coogan: Good to speak with you. It’s been a long time.

[00:02:22] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:02:23] Kenny Coogan: But I think we’ve known each other for a couple of years now, and….

[00:02:27] Jacob Soule: I think like maybe a little over one year.

[00:02:29] Kenny Coogan: Yeah.

[00:02:29] Jacob Soule: But I … was introduced to you when I first joined the ICPS in like early 2022.

[00:02:37] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. And the ICPS is the International Carnivorous Plant Society, so that’s where we met through. And your Instagram and TikTok account name is @ThePlantProdigy. And on TikTok you have over 976,000 followers.

[00:02:56] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:02:56] Kenny Coogan: So you’re, you’re approaching 1 million followers. So [00:03:00] what is your goal with your social media accounts?

[00:03:04] Jacob Soule: I would say to inspire people to grow amazing plants and love the world for what it is.

[00:03:10] Kenny Coogan: So on your channels, you offer plant advice.

[00:03:14] Jacob Soule: Uh-huh.

[00:03:15] Kenny Coogan: And where do you find the questions from?

[00:03:18] Jacob Soule: People just send to me over like DMs or anything like that. I’ll sometimes answer them if I have time.

[00:03:25] Kenny Coogan: And why do you think your channels are so popular?

[00:03:28] Jacob Soule: I would say luck.

[00:03:31] Kenny Coogan: Anything else?

[00:03:31] Jacob Soule: Maybe also, cause I think I might have, I don’t want sound narcissistic or anything like that cause I’m not like that, but maybe people like my personality.

[00:03:41] Kenny Coogan: I would agree with that. I think people like your personality and your straightforwardness.

[00:03:46] Jacob Soule: I’ve had a little bit of criticism in the past for something. But if you’re gonna be a public figure, you have to learn to deal with criticism. So that’s why I usually either respond to ’em in a positive way or just ignore ’em.

[00:03:59] Kenny Coogan: How [00:04:00] many carnivorous plant questions do you get compared to house plants and ornamentals?

[00:04:06] Jacob Soule: For every 10 house plant questions, I get one carnivorous plant question, but I’m not a hundred percent sure.

What Are Carnivorous Plants?

[00:04:12] Kenny Coogan: So today we’re gonna focus on celebrating carnivorous plants. And listeners are probably familiar with the Venus fly trap, but there are 800 to 1000 other species of plants that have evolved carnivorous behaviors.

[00:04:28] So Jacob, how do you define what is a carnivorous plant?

[00:04:33] Jacob Soule: Well, I define what carnivorous plant is based on a few things. First, it needs to lure in its prey. So basically like if there’s like nectar or anything like that, that attracts it, animals, like insects, especially, that’s one criteria. Secondly, it has to digest the insect on its own, which some plants, such as Heliamphora, I think, or Darlingtonia or the Cobra Lilly, won’t digest it on their own. They like [00:05:00] have micro organ…. or even Sarracenia purpurea. They, they even have microorganisms in them that help bring them down, but, and don’t really produce digestive enzymes, but….

[00:05:09] Kenny Coogan: So they have like symbiotic bacteria that helps them break down their prey?

[00:05:13] Jacob Soule: Yeah, that’s what I’m trying to say.

[00:05:15] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. And then what’s….

[00:05:17] Jacob Soule: Well, so that’s, that’s more optional. Like if, yeah. As long as they have one or one or both. I would say that would be the criteria for a true carnivorous plant.

[00:05:25] Kenny Coogan: And then they have to benefit from the digested prey.

[00:05:28] Jacob Soule: Oh. And that.

North American Carnivorous Plants

[00:05:31] Kenny Coogan: So what habitats can carnivorous plants be found in?

[00:05:35] Jacob Soule: Oh, all kinds, but mostly swamps and bogs.

[00:05:38] Kenny Coogan: So you’re in, uh, Michigan?

[00:05:41] Jacob Soule: Mm-hmm.

[00:05:42] Kenny Coogan: And do you have any carnivorous plants there? Wild carnivorous plants?

[00:05:46] Jacob Soule: Uhhuh. Sarracenia purpurea, Drosera rotundifolia, Drosera intermedia, Utricularia, a lot.

[00:05:54] Sarracenia is a species of pitcher plant, a type of pitcher plant, not to be confused with a tropical pitcher plants or Nepenthes [00:06:00] found in southeast Asia. Basically instead of like hanging down from trees, these pitchers will grow out the ground and are generally smaller or skinnier than the Nepenthes.

[00:06:11] Kenny Coogan: And they have little modified leaves that catch the bugs.

[00:06:15] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:06:17] Kenny Coogan: And then, um, what about Drosera? What’s the common name for that?

[00:06:21] Jacob Soule: Sundew. There are all several different species that are found all over the world, most especially in Australia, but there are a few species native to Michigan, such as the round-leaved sundew, Drosera rotundifolia, and the spatulate leaved sundew, Drosera intermedia, if I pronounce that common name correctly.

[00:06:39] With sundews, they basically have several sticky tentacles on leaves, and these tentacles have nectar at the end, or, and nectar on leaves attract insects. And once the insect gets stuck, the tentacles and potentially even the leaf will slowly curl around them, pushing ’em towards the center of the leaf and digesting them.

[00:06:57] Kenny Coogan: And what does, uh, [00:07:00] Sarracenia mostly eat?

[00:07:02] Jacob Soule: Mostly insects. Like flies, wasps.

[00:07:06] Kenny Coogan: And then what about the sundews? What are they eating?

[00:07:08] Jacob Soule: Like fungus gnats, depending on the species, maybe like small flies and ants. But I would say a lot of fungus gnats will be caught by sundews as well as maybe smaller flies and ants.

[00:07:20] Kenny Coogan: So in Michigan, you’re studying environmental sustainability. And the listeners of this podcast are gonna love that major. What are some of your goals?

[00:07:30] Jacob Soule: My goal is actually to like own my own nursery one day, maybe that specializes in carnivorous plants, something similar to the California Carnivores, or RedLeaf Exotics, or anything like that, or Carnivera, or something like that.

Celebrating Carnivorous Plants

[00:07:41] Kenny Coogan: So the International Carnivorous Plant Society is proud to promote World’s Carnivorous Plant Day to be held on the first Wednesday of May each year. And this year, 2023, is the third annual World’s Carnivorous Plant Day. And on that day, the International Carnivorous Plant Society [00:08:00] post a number of online events including a photo contest, and they publish about 20, 24 videos that are free to the public through their YouTube and Facebook channels. So Jacob, why is it important for people to celebrate carnivorous plants?

[00:08:17] Jacob Soule: Because they’re really special and a lot of them are incredibly in danger, especially with the habitat construction of bogs to make way for McMansions and crap like that.

[00:08:25] Kenny Coogan: That is true. Are you intrigued by carnivorous plants because of how they eat, of how they look?

[00:08:32] Jacob Soule: All, all the above.

Feeding Carnivorous Plants Indoors: Flies, Liquid Fertilizers, and Pelets

[00:08:33] Kenny Coogan: What species of carnivorous plants are you currently growing?

[00:08:37] Jacob Soule: Mostly Nepenthes. They’re tropical pitcher plants. Like, lemme me show you an example right here. This one’s just a baby, but it’s called Nepenthes truncata. And this species will get big enough to eat rats when it’s mature, or mice.

[00:08:51] Kenny Coogan: So how large will the actual plant become?

[00:08:55] Jacob Soule: I would say maybe three, four feet across. With pitchers, upwards of 20 inches long, potentially, [00:09:00] by four or five inches across at the mouth, probably like really long, big pitchers. And this species is a lot easier to grow than another big pitcher species that everyone’s probably familiar with, Nepenthes rajah. And this one you, you might succeed with it as a house plant, especially if you know what you’re doing.

[00:09:17] Kenny Coogan: We’re on a podcast, but you’re showing me your plants in the dorm, and you’re growing them under grow lights or just by the windowsill?

[00:09:24] Jacob Soule: Both. I’m using a combination of both.

[00:09:27] Kenny Coogan: So the Nepenthes, which are the tropical pitcher plants, they make, uh, good house plants?

[00:09:33] Jacob Soule: Many species do and hybrids do, but there are some species and hybrids that you probably won’t be growing as well. Nepenthes hamata, Nepenthes villosa, Nepenthes raja, Nepenthes bicalcarata, maybe. Like those are the kinds you won’t grow, you need a greenhouse for in really specialized conditions.

[00:09:46] Kenny Coogan: And how do the Nepenthes lure and attract their prey?

[00:09:52] Jacob Soule: Oh, it actually depends on the species. With most species, they have nectar on the underside of the lid and along the rim of the pitcher that attracts [00:10:00] ants and other small insects. And potentially with some species, like larger species, like that truncata I showed you, even larger animals like rodents.

[00:10:08] So basically these animals will be attracted to that and once they get along the pitcher rim, they might slip, especially when it’s raining, like which it rains a lot in the native habitats of those plants, and fall in and it gets digested.

[00:10:20] Kenny Coogan: So you’re in a dorm and hopefully you don’t have a lot of rats.

[00:10:24] Jacob Soule: Nope.

[00:10:25] Kenny Coogan: Are you hand feeding them?

[00:10:27] Jacob Soule: Most of ’em are pretty small, so I’m just letting ’em catch stuff like fungus gnats.

[00:10:31] Kenny Coogan: And that’s working for them?

[00:10:33] Jacob Soule: Yeah, I believe so. I might give ’em a little bit of Maxsea later, but so far so good. I gave all my carnivorous plants I’m keeping at home in my grow tent Maxsea last week or the week before.

[00:10:43] Kenny Coogan: And what is Maxsea?

[00:10:45] Jacob Soule: It’s a type of fertilizer that I highly recommend for carnivorous plants for foliar feeding. And it should help them grow better.

[00:10:51] Kenny Coogan: And it’s a seaweed fertilizer that’s safe for carnivorous plants.

[00:10:56] Jacob Soule: Yeah, I believe it’s safe for most carnivorous plants. I’ve heard some conflicting [00:11:00] things, but it depends on what works for you. Some people might not find Maxsea works for them, but others might find that it’ll work for them. I think I heard that it contains something called urea that might not be good if it gets into the soil, so I would be careful not to get it in the soil.

[00:11:13] Kenny Coogan: What about other fertilizers? Are those safe?

[00:11:16] Jacob Soule: Well, Osmocote can be used on the Nepenthes if you’d like, put like, depending on the size of the pitcher, you could put like 1, 2, 5 in really big pictures, you put like one in a smaller picture and like five in a really big picture. That can help Nepenthes grow better.

[00:11:29] Kenny Coogan: So you could put the Osmocote pellets right into the pitcher, like you’re feeding them.

[00:11:33] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:11:34] I’ve heard of Alaska Fish Fertilizer working well for some people, but I haven’t tried that before.

[00:11:39] Kenny Coogan: But generally speaking, there’s only a couple of fertilizers that are okay for carnivorous plants.

[00:11:46] Jacob Soule: Yeah, I believe so. Especially, they’re especially good. They’re good with foliar feeding. So, I don’t really fertilize ’em in the soil.

[00:11:53] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. If you use a different fertilizer, what will happen to the carnivorous plants?

[00:11:58] Jacob Soule: It can potentially have an overload of [00:12:00] nutrients and be severely stunted or die.

[00:12:02] Kenny Coogan: Because they’ve evolved to get their nutrients from the bugs that they eat?

[00:12:06] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:12:07] Kenny Coogan: All right. So do you grow any other carnivorous plants other than Nepenthes?

[00:12:12] Jacob Soule: Well, I tried growing sundews in my dorm, but that didn’t really work out cause I don’t think they have enough light. Plus the water quality is pretty bad here, like, and I don’t really have a choice. Nepenthes I know they’re a lot more tolerant of harder water than, say, sundews or, or other carnivorous plants. So, that’s why I like ’em so much. Cause that makes ’em a lot more like regular house plants.

[00:12:30] Kenny Coogan: And speaking of regular house plants, are you growing non-carnivorous plants in your dorm as well?

[00:12:36] Jacob Soule: Uh-huh! Some Philodendrons, Monstera, Calathea, a staghorn fern. And I’ll say that’s about it for here. Oh, and a canna lily.

[00:12:45] Kenny Coogan: Are you working or volunteering at the school’s, uh, greenhouse?

[00:12:50] Jacob Soule: Oh yeah, of course I am. I’m, I work there.

[00:12:54] Kenny Coogan: Oh, that’s very good.

[00:12:55] Jacob Soule: That’s, that’s my part-time job there, like on Mondays, Wednesdays, and fridays.

[00:12:59] Kenny Coogan: That [00:13:00] sounds perfect for you. And, um, what do you do in the greenhouse?

[00:13:03] Jacob Soule: Oh, basically maintenance work like cleanup the greenhouse, water plants , pot up plants, et cetera. A lot, really.

Growing Carnivorous Plants Indoors

[00:13:10] Kenny Coogan: So I wanna go back to the most famous carnivorous plant, which of course is the….?

[00:13:16] Jacob Soule: Venus flytrap. Dionaea muscipula.

[00:13:18] Kenny Coogan: Exactly. So the scientific name is Dionaea muscipula. Very good, Jacob. And how do they catch their prey?

[00:13:25] Jacob Soule: Basically, the inside of the leaves are red, which might attract insects, such as ants or flies. But, actually Venus flytraps I believe trap more ants than flies in the wild. So basically insects are attracted to that. And there are three trigger hairs on each lobe of a leaf. And believe it or not, in order for them to trap the shot, two hairs must be touched in 30 seconds or one hair must be touched twice within 30 seconds for the trap to close so that they know that there’s an insect there.

[00:13:51] As the insect struggles, it hits more hair, then that causes a trap to close tighter, and then it gets closer to the bottom and will, and the plant releases digestive enzymes [00:14:00] and the, and the insect is digested. In I say maybe 10-ish days later it would open up back up and and it would have only the carcass out of it, an exoskeleton.

[00:14:09] Kenny Coogan: Now earlier you mentioned in Michigan you have Utricularia. And what is a common name for that?

[00:14:16] Jacob Soule: Bladderwort.

[00:14:18] Kenny Coogan: Bladderworts are found kind of all over the world. And how do they trap their prey?

[00:14:23] Jacob Soule: There are species that grow both terrestrially and in water. So basically once an, an insect will get close to the trap, and then they’ll like touch trigger hairs along the mouth. And then once they do the traps opens up faster than a blink of an eye. We’re talking like milliseconds here, and then it closes and then the insect is quickly digested.

[00:14:42] Kenny Coogan: So if people wanna grow them, usually they grow them for their flowers.

[00:14:46] Jacob Soule: Yeah, a lot of ’em have really beautiful flowers that look almost like orchids.

[00:14:49] Kenny Coogan: Now, are there any other, um, favorite carnivorous plants that people might not be familiar with?

[00:14:55] Jacob Soule: Oh, Heliamphora is one. I, I’ve never grown or even seen one before, but, cause they’re so [00:15:00] hard to grow and probably won’t make good house plants, from what I’ve heard.

[00:15:03] Kenny Coogan: What’s the common name?

[00:15:04] Jacob Soule: Sun pitcher plants. They’re native to the tepui mountain ranges in Brazil, Guyana, and Venezuela. They’re closely related to Sarracenia. And like with Sarracenia, insects will get close to the rim and then fall in and get digested.

[00:15:18] Kenny Coogan: Any other really cool carnivorous plants?

[00:15:20] Jacob Soule: Oh, I mentioned Darlingtonia californica earlier, or the Cobra Lilly. They’re from California and Oregon, and they’re also related to Sarracenia. They basically have like this one giant hood on the top and a hole on the bottom, and insects will like crawl into that hole and they’ll see light, light from coming in from the top and they’ll fly, try to fly into that, and then they’ll exhaust themselves and fall to the bottom of the trap where bacterial acid will digest them.

Butterworts: Flowering Carnivorous Plants

[00:15:42] Kenny Coogan: Something we haven’t mentioned are the butterworts.

[00:15:47] Jacob Soule: Oh yeah. California Carnivores loves breeding them.

[00:15:51] Basically, they’re in the same family as bladderworts, but instead of sucking insects into the trap, they have big sticky leaves, much like sundews, but [00:16:00] without the giant tentacles. And insects will get stuck for those. And if insects get stuck to those, the plant will itself will release digestive enzymes and digest them. It rarely catches really big insects, though. I think the butterworts, or Pinguicula, as they are known in Latin, are better off at, are probably the best at controlling fungus gnats when it comes to plants, other than artificial traps.

[00:16:22] Kenny Coogan: You can find them pretty easily online. They’re pretty popular as house plants. Because people who grow non-carnivorous plants, once they get those fungus gnats or fruit fly problems, they kind of look for Pinguicula as a way to control their bugs.

[00:16:39] Jacob Soule: And the thing about especially tropical Pinguicula that are native in Mexico and Latin America, is that they’ve become “dormant” in the winter. Instead of producing the carnivorous-like leaves, they’ll produce more succulent like leaves. And when they get drier, those leaves won’t catch their bugs, unfortunately, but they’ll still flower during that stage.

[00:16:56] Kenny Coogan: And that’s another carnivorous plant that people like [00:17:00] to grow cuz they’re beautiful and they eat bugs.

[00:17:02] Jacob Soule: Yeah. And they can also be propagated via leaves, most of them. A lot like succulents.

[00:17:07] Kenny Coogan: You could just pull a leaf off and put it on the top of the soil.

[00:17:10] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:17:11] Kenny Coogan: And then it grows a little baby.

[00:17:12] Jacob Soule: Yeah, it does. It’s like a succulent.

[00:17:15] Kenny Coogan: All right, so we’re gonna take a quick break in our conversation to hear a word from our sponsor, and when we return, we will learn how to grow carnivorous plants.

Audio Articles from Grit, MOTHER EARTH NEWS, and More

[00:17:27] John Moore: At Mother Earth News and Friends, we want to deliver quality audio content in a variety of ways, and that’s why we created audio articles, a new way to tune in to our magazines. From new issues of Grit, Mother Earth News, and more, we produce a selection of recorded articles to share with our listeners at Mother Earth News and Friends. There are a wide variety of topics, from pasture maintenance to creating a vertical garden in your apartment. Keep an eye out for episodes titled “Audio [00:18:00] Article” wherever you listen to us.

[00:18:02] And now back to our conversation with Jacob.

Overwintering Carnivorous Plants

[00:18:07] Kenny Coogan: We are back with Jacob Soule, the plant prodigy. And uh, Jacob, you have a social media question.

[00:18:15] Jacob Soule: Yeah?

[00:18:16] Kenny Coogan: It’s from @IndivisibleBy3. And they write, “My neighbor has filled their entire backyard with carnivorous plants. They are so beautiful and bizarre to me. He gave us one to care for. It turned black over wintertime. Yikes. Did we kill it?”

[00:18:36] Jacob Soule: It depends on the species, actually. If you got a tropical species like say Nepenthes or a tropical sundew, like a Cape sundew, then yeah, it’s probably dead.

[00:18:46] But if it’s like say a Sarracenia or Venus flytrap, then I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t give up. Cause those plants will actually go dormant in the winter and come back in the spring. So I would just leave ’em out in like a chilly area, maybe, uh, preferably above [00:19:00] 10 to 20 degrees Fahrenheit. But if they’re in a bog garden in the ground, they can go in and they can go well below zero degrees Fahrenheit if they’re properly protected in the winter or mulched.

Venus Flytrap: Carnivorous Plant Soil and Water Needs

[00:19:10] Kenny Coogan: All right, so let’s get into the specifics one by one. How much water should you use for a Venus flytrap?

[00:19:17] Jacob Soule: Oh, Venus flytraps. I would try and use distilled or rainwater for them. I would say maybe like keep a saucer full and maybe like let it dry out for a day and then water it again once that saucer is dry after 24 to 48 hours. That’s what I would say if you’re keeping it in a pot. But I prefer to grow them in a bog garden. And like big, like dig a hole in the ground, put a plastic pot or container in there. Fill it up with peat and maybe some sand or Perlite and plant the Venus flytrap in that, and that will do a lot better for them. I have one at home, actually.

[00:19:46] Kenny Coogan: So Venus flytraps, they want their soil to be kind of damp to a little wet?

[00:19:51] Jacob Soule: Yeah, but not too wet.

[00:19:53] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. And how much light should you give a Venus flytrap?

[00:19:57] Jacob Soule: Oh, I would say maybe bright light, like I [00:20:00] would say maybe if you’re growing inside. God forbid, but they’re better off outside. But I would say full sun outside or south facing window inside.

[00:20:07] Kenny Coogan: And maybe even a grow light if they’re inside.

[00:20:10] Jacob Soule: Or maybe even a grow light, yeah.

[00:20:12] Kenny Coogan: You kind of mentioned the temperature. What’s the temperature range for a Venus flytrap?

[00:20:16] Jacob Soule: USDA Zones 8 to 10 without protection. But with protection they can survive down the USDA Zone 5.

[00:20:24] Kenny Coogan: And how would you protect them? You put mulch over them?

[00:20:27] Jacob Soule: At home I basically put a giant bucket over it, like a foam, one of those foam protection buckets, like the foam, foam insulation bucket, like, uh, out of the garden center. And it seems to be okay so far. And winter’s almost over, so it will probably come back.

[00:20:40] Kenny Coogan: And then the Venus flytrap kind of, it, it’s a perennial, so it lives more than one year, but they’re really only growing from like March through September, right?

[00:20:51] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

Cape Sundew Plant Care: Watering with Distilled Water

[00:20:51] Kenny Coogan: Now I think you mentioned this one, Drosera capensis.

[00:20:55] Jacob Soule: That’s another common carnivorous plant you might find in big box stores and garden centers.

[00:20:59] Kenny Coogan: [00:21:00] And what’s the common name for that?

[00:21:01] Jacob Soule: Cape sundew. Cause it’s native to the Cape of South Africa.

[00:21:04] Kenny Coogan: And how do you grow them?

[00:21:06] Jacob Soule: Maybe like keep the soil a little more wet than the Venus flytrap, like keep them in a saucer that’s always full of distilled water or rainwater and give ’em bright light, like a south window would probably be best. Or maybe a grow light if you don’t have a south window, or in the winter.

[00:21:19] Kenny Coogan: So these are good house plants or good windowsill plants.

[00:21:23] Jacob Soule: Yeah, I haven’t succeeded in keeping them long term, unfortunately yet, cause of my water quality, and I don’t really wanna spend money on distilled water, but I’m hoping I’ll maybe try again eventually.

[00:21:32] Kenny Coogan: So you mentioned distilled water and rainwater, or reverse osmosis water for Venus flytraps and sundews. So why do carnivorous plants need pure water?

[00:21:43] Jacob Soule: They need pure water because they’ve evolved in nutrient poor habitats with little, very little minerals in the soil. But when you give them like hard water or tap water, depending on your location, that can add minerals to the soil and therefore overwhelm and kills a plant, most carnivorous plants at least.

[00:21:59] Kenny Coogan: And if you have [00:22:00] a water meter stick that measures the parts per million of total dissolved solids, do you know what number it should be?

[00:22:08] Jacob Soule: 50 parts per million or less.

[00:22:11] Kenny Coogan: Have you tested your tap water or city water?

[00:22:14] Jacob Soule: No, I haven’t, but I know it’s too bad for it cause I haven’t succeeded with those plants. But maybe I’ll try get and actually, like invest in like distilled water from Meijer or something.

[00:22:23] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. So you’re in Michigan, but I’m in Tampa, Florida, and my city water is 347 parts per million, which is, you know, seven or eight times more than what a carnivorous plant can handle. So I also have to buy distilled water or use rainwater to keep my carnivorous plants alive.

American Pitcher Plant Varieties

[00:22:42] Kenny Coogan: All right. Now you mentioned Sarracenia, which is one type of North American pitcher plant, and there’s maybe like eight….

[00:22:48] Jacob Soule: Yeah, there are several species. Most of ’em are found in the southeast United States. And a lot of them will grow alongside the Venus fytrap and cultivation. So, I would say if you’re growing ’em outdoors, I would suggest the same, the exact same thing [00:23:00] for them with the Venus flytrap. Grow ’em in a large bog garden that might, may or may not be submerged in the ground.

[00:23:05] Kenny Coogan: And they’re in like a peat-Perlite or peat-sand mixture?

[00:23:09] Jacob Soule: I grow mine in pure peat and they seem okay, so, but I would maybe add Perlite or sand to it as well to make it a little more drained, slightly better.

[00:23:17] Kenny Coogan: All right, so they’re in a nutrient poor soil and like the flytrap, they’re in full sun. And they can also do the same temperature range as a flytrap?

[00:23:27] Jacob Soule: Yeah. But Sarracenia purpurea, that species can survive. Like Sarracenia purpurea subsp.. purpurea can survive, which is native here, can survive like down the USDA Zone 2 or 3, I believe.

[00:23:40] Kenny Coogan: Because it’s native to Canada and Michigan.

[00:23:42] Jacob Soule: Yeah. Really. It’s really hardy. But the other species, I would say mulch in USDA Zone 7 or colder, or protect them in another way.

[00:23:51] Kenny Coogan: All right. How soggy do they want their soil?

[00:23:54] Jacob Soule: I would say the same as the Venus flytrap.

[00:23:56] Kenny Coogan: Kinda damp to wet?

[00:23:58] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:23:59] Kenny Coogan: This might [00:24:00] be your favorite. I think it is your favorite group of, uh, carnivorous plants. The Nepenthes.

[00:24:05] Jacob Soule: Yeah. I love them.

[00:24:06] Kenny Coogan: Which are the tropical pitcher plants. And I also love them, but I think I’m growing the opposite of what you’re growing.

[00:24:12] So growers classify them into two groups: lowland Nepenthes and highland Nepenthes. So Jacob, what is the difference, or what does that mean?

[00:24:22] Jacob Soule: Lowland basically means they’re found below a thousand years or 3,300 feet. They experience really hot days and really warm nights above 70 degrees usually. And highlanders are found above that, and depending on the elevation, can experience days maybe in the seventies or low eighties and nights, maybe in the fifties or sixties.

[00:24:43] Kenny Coogan: So the lowlanders are like sea level plants that like it hot and humid.

[00:24:48] Jacob Soule: Yeah. But I’ve grown some species. A few low landers can actually handle household conditions, especially in like the east with some success. But, I would really suggest hybrids between highlanders and lowlanders. That’s the [00:25:00] best bet for, for new time Nepenthes growers.

[00:25:03] Kenny Coogan: So naturally occurring hybrids exist between lowland and highland Nepenthes?

[00:25:08] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:25:09] Kenny Coogan: And is there a term for that?

[00:25:11] Jacob Soule: Most of the time natural hybrids are between highlands and lowlands. So I would say in most highlands and lowland Nepenthes, they’re artificially made.

[00:25:20] Kenny Coogan: And we call them intermediate Nepenthes.

[00:25:22] Jacob Soule: Yeah, we do.

[00:25:23] Kenny Coogan: So if somebody is interested in getting one, do they Google “intermediate Nepenthes” or is there a, or what should they be searching?

[00:25:31] Jacob Soule: I’ll be looking for Nepenthes sanguinea, Nepenthes truncata, like I just showed you, Nepenthes veitchii, Nepenthes ventricosa, and those kinds of species.

[00:25:41] Kenny Coogan: All right. Because they need the same temperature, which is what a household usually is.

[00:25:47] Jacob Soule: Yeah. As well as hybrid between those.

Pitcher Plant Care: Water and Soil Needs

[00:25:51] Kenny Coogan: And what, uh, soil do Nepenthes grow well in?

[00:25:55] Jacob Soule: I grow mine in just pure sphagnum peat moss, and they seem okay. I’ve heard of [00:26:00] people growing ’em in heavy wash coco coir. But I haven’t really tried that before, but maybe I will one day, once I get big plants and I don’t have enough sphagnum moss to fill giant pots, and I’ll have, I’ll probably have to do that.

[00:26:11] Kenny Coogan: Because I’m in Florida, I grow a lot of lowland Nepenthes, which like it between 70 and 90 degrees, because I can grow them outside. Sometimes I grow them in long fiber sphagnum, but I also grow them in the coconut coir and the coconut chips, which is just kind of mulched up coconut husks. And then also sometimes I add Perlite to give them some aeration.

[00:26:32] How, uh, soggy do they want their soil compared to the other plants we talked about?

[00:26:38] Jacob Soule: Not nearly as soggy. I would say water them like you would with a regular philodendron or Monstera.

[00:26:44] Kenny Coogan: So like water them pretty heavy. And then you can wait week or two and kind of let ’em dry up.

[00:26:49] Jacob Soule: That’s what I’ve noticed for most of them.

[00:26:52] Kenny Coogan: And because they’re not sitting in the water like the Sarracenia or the sundews or the Venus flytraps, you can kind of get [00:27:00] away with giving, um, a little harder water that has more minerals.

[00:27:04] Jacob Soule: Yeah, you can, but you might have to change the soil out more.

[00:27:07] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. Or else the pitchers will kind of get deformed.

[00:27:10] Jacob Soule: Yeah. And they’ll also appreciate a little higher humidity, a lot of ’em.

[00:27:14] Kenny Coogan: And what about lighting for Nepenthes? How much light should they get?

[00:27:18] Jacob Soule: Not nearly as much as, say, a Sarracenia, but I would say for a lot of ’em, it depends on the species. Some of like, especially the lowlanders, will prefer a less light than say the highlanders.

[00:27:28] Kenny Coogan: So you might be fine with a sunny window. You might not even need a grow light.

[00:27:32] Jacob Soule: Yeah, an east-facing window would probably be best for most Nepenthes.

[00:27:36] Kenny Coogan: So Nepenthes, they’re vining plants. How large do they get?

[00:27:40] Jacob Soule: It depends on the species. Some vines like Nepenthes ampullaria and like, or Nepenthes rafflesiana can go like 70, 60 feet into the canopy. Well, like many, the large Nepenthes species like truncata or rajah don’t really form vines and are more like shrubs that produce really short vines that are like rarely longer than three or four feet.

Carnivorous Plant Safety: Houseplants for Everyone

[00:27:58] Kenny Coogan: But those plants can eat [00:28:00] like a couple of mice a year when they’re mature. Whereas ampullaria is like the size of a golf ball. They’re pitchers, but they still have a huge vine.

[00:28:07] Now people might have seen, uh, the “Little Shop of Horrors.” Are there any carnivorous plants that are large enough to eat a human.

[00:28:15] Jacob Soule: Nuh-uh.

[00:28:15] Kenny Coogan: So we shouldn’t be scared?

[00:28:17] Jacob Soule: No.

[00:28:17] Kenny Coogan: And are carnivorous plants safe for small children and pets?

[00:28:22] Jacob Soule: Yeah. I believe a lot of ’em are like, I don’t think any of ’em are really that toxic.

[00:28:26] Kenny Coogan: Because they’re really just using nectar to attract their prey.

[00:28:30] April is World Autism Month. And why did you think it was important to say in the description of your popular TikTok account that you have autism?

[00:28:41] Jacob Soule: I would say because some people might not understand me very well and they, I wanna help people understand me better.

[00:28:46] Kenny Coogan: So I understand you wanna like start a carnivorous plant nursery after college.

[00:28:50] Jacob Soule: Well, just a nursery in general, anything like that.

[00:28:53] Kenny Coogan: Okay. So what are some of your favorite plants right now?

[00:28:56] Jacob Soule: Oh, non-carnivorous? I know there’s something called the telegraph plant that will actually dance, [00:29:00] like move like, which I’ll show you right here.

[00:29:02] Like this little plant here, that plant there will actually move its leaves to light, heat, and even sound, allegedly.

[00:29:07] Kenny Coogan: Why are you so attracted to plants in general?

[00:29:11] Jacob Soule: I would say cause of my autism makes me hyper fixate.

[00:29:14] Kenny Coogan: And then you’re just like doing like a deep dive on the internet or in books?

[00:29:18] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:29:19] Kenny Coogan: What are some of your favorite resources to learn about carnivorous plants?

[00:29:23] Jacob Soule: Oh, one I really like is The Savage Garden by Peter D’Amato.

[00:29:27] Kenny Coogan: So that’s a book.

[00:29:28] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:29:28] Kenny Coogan: And is there any other places you go to to learn about carnivorous plants?

[00:29:32] Jacob Soule: Instagram and Facebook are two good resources depending on the people who are posting.

Breeding, Propagating, and Growing Carnivorous Plants

[00:29:37] Kenny Coogan: One thing that’s fun about growing carnivorous plants is breeding them or propagating them. For Nepenthes, which are your favorite, and they’re probably my favorite too, the plants are either male or female.

[00:29:52] Jacob Soule: Which is referred to as being dioecious.

[00:29:54] Kenny Coogan: So they’re dioecious plants. I hear that one of your plants is flowering [00:30:00] now.

[00:30:00] Jacob Soule: Yeah, my Nepenthes truncata is flowering. A big one I got from Redleaf Exotics a while back, but it doesn’t have any pitchers on it now, unfortunately, but I’m hoping it grows them soon. But, It’s flowering male, and I’m gonna send pollen to someone who I won’t disclose here for a hybrid, for their female Nepenthes singalana × diabolica. We’re gonna create Nepenthes singalana × diabolica × truncata, hopefully. The reverse cross has been done before by Predatory Plants and Carnivero, but this is the first time the truncata is a male, I think.

[00:30:31] Kenny Coogan: So when you are reading the labels, the first name or the first group in the parentheses are the female.

[00:30:39] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:30:40] Kenny Coogan: And then, then the second set is the pollen source.

[00:30:44] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:30:45] Kenny Coogan: Because people love carnivorous plants and they love Nepenthes, there’s like different groups and Facebook groups where you can exchange pollen and then you can create really complex hybrids.

[00:30:56] Jacob Soule: People have been breeding Nepenthes since the 1800s. There are [00:31:00] many hybrids from the 1800s, like Nepenthes × dyeriana, which is more early 1900s. Than there’s Nepenthes × mixta, and then there’s Nepenthes × wrigleyana , if I pronounced that right. And then there’s like Nepenthes × coccinea and then there’s other hybrids. Like the first one was Nepenthes × dominii, which was created in, I believe 1862.

[00:31:18] Kenny Coogan: Like England, they had all these, uh, greenhouses and they were breeding Nepenthes back then.

[00:31:23] Jacob Soule: Yeah. But then it kinda slowed down after World War 1 and 2. But it started picking up again in like the seventies and eighties and now we’re, I feel like we’re in a true golden age of Nepenthes now with like PP [Predatory Plants], Borneo Exotics, Redleaf Exotics, Carnivero, all those people.

[00:31:38] Kenny Coogan: Yeah. There’s tons of nurseries around the world that are breeding really complex, beautiful Nepenthes.

[00:31:44] Jacob, I wanna go back just one second to when you were talking about how one of your favorite books is The Savage Garden by Peter D’Amato. And, that’s a huge book and I’m just curious, can you read it and then you like memorize it all or are you….

[00:31:59] Jacob Soule: [00:32:00] I’ve been reading it for years.

[00:32:01] Kenny Coogan: Do you highlight the book?

[00:32:03] Jacob Soule: No, I’ve just been memorizing it. I’ve been reading it for years and years and years.

[00:32:07] Kenny Coogan: And that’s how you can just rattle off all those Victorian hybrids.

[00:32:11] Jacob Soule: Yeah.

[00:32:11] Kenny Coogan: Well that’s very impressive.

[00:32:14] Thank you, Jacob, and I’m excited for World’s Carnivorous Plant Day this year.

[00:32:19] Jacob Soule: Yeah, I am too.

[00:32:20] Kenny Coogan: Thank you so much, Jacob, the plant prodigy, for speaking with us today. Our conversation on growing carnivorous plants was very enlightening.

[00:32:31] We thank you, the listener, for joining our podcast and encourage you to share it with your friends, colleagues, and family. To listen to more podcasts or to learn more, visit our website, www.MotherEarthNews.com. You can also follow our social media platforms from that link.

[00:32:49] And remember, no matter how brown your thumb is, you can always cultivate kindness.

Cultivate Kindness with More Mother Earth NEws and Friends

[00:32:57] John Moore: You’ve just listened to our episode about [00:33:00] carnivorous plants. You can reach us at Letters@MotherEarthNews.com with any comments or suggestions.

[00:33:09] Our podcast production team includes Jessica Mitchell, John Moore, and Kenny Coogan. Music for this episode is “Travel Light” by Jason Shaw. This Mother Earth News and Friends podcast is a production of Ogden Publications. Learn more about us at www.MotherEarthNews.com.

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[00:34:22] Until next time, don’t forget to love your Mother.

Meet Jacob Soule

Jacob Soule has been growing carnivorous plants for 6 years. He says his passion and expertise for carnivorous plants was heightened through his autism, which allowed him to hyper-fixate on these intriguing plants. He is currently a student at Western Michigan University studying environmental sustainability and is growing a countless number of carnivorous plants including Nepenthes (tropical pitcher plants) and Venus flytraps.

Additional Resources

Follow Jacob @ThePlantProdigy on TikTok and Instagram

 Our Podcast Team

Jessica Mitchell, John Moore, and Kenny Coogan
Music: “Travel Light” by Jason Shaw

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The Mother Earth News and Friends podcasts are a production of Ogden Publications.