Garden: Cuttings from my Pitcher Cannibal Plant

Finally I did it. I made cuttings from one of my Pitcher Cannibal plant (or Nepenthes). Here's how I did it.  Take a look at the picture above. There are two cannibal plants. And both of them are starting to have vines. I took the plant on the right side with two vines, and I cut off one vine. I felt sad doing this because the vine had a lot of lovely pitchers, but it seemed time to propagate.

I have pictures of the vine I cut and my materials which show sphagnum moss, perlite, and pots. I also used rooting hormone which comes in a small bottle.

I've never done this before so I followed the directions posted in the internet (Google "How to Make Nepenthes Cuttings), such as this one.

I counted three nodes and made my cut using a clean razor blade. I left the three leaves intact although some directions called for halving the leaves. I cut off the tendrils with pitchers (I saw some half-digested bugs in them). I stuck the cuttings in the moist mixture of 50-50 sphagnum moss and perlite. I placed a layer of sphagnum moss on top to keep it moist (this is my own decision and I hope I don't cause the cuttings to rot).

Here are pictures of the four cuttings.  I'm going to see how these do, and if they survive, I'll make more cuttings next week.

I'm rather excited about this project. My pitcher plants have been so flamboyant and healthy, it would be fun to propagate them and give them away. (I have a number of requests already.)

Read also
The Case of My Movable Trees
Helping the Birds and Bees with a Feeder and Fountains
How my Orchds and Cannibal Plants are Doing

Tags: garden, gardening, cuttings, propagation, cannibal plant, pitcher plant, nepenthes, tropical, bog plants

This is all for now. Have a great week!
Cecilia