3 Common Venus Fly Trap Care Mistakes That Slowly Kill Your Carnivorous Plant (Updated 2024)

Avoid these 3 venus fly trap care mistakes that are slowly killing your carnivorous plant.

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You will likely slowly kill your venus flytrap if you participate in any of these care mistakes. It's easy to mess up venus flytrap care. They go against most conventional gardening wisdom. They aren't hard to care for, you just have to be willing to learn a new skill.

Venus Flytrap Care Videos

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[tylersimpson]

Been watching your videos for a few months and following your uploads and I want to let you know this is probably the best Carnivorous Plant care channel on YouTube/the internet!
About two months ago I started growing varying kinds of drosera and multiple flytraps in a Vivosun tent and Vivosun light(which surprisingly works amazing and made my Lowe’s rescue traps turn from light green to a vibrant maroon color) and you’ve helped me out A LOT with little yet very helpful details not many other growers talk about. I live in the southern tip of West Virginia and there’s literally nobody around me that grows these plants that I was able to learn from, so figuring out the specific things I needed to do based on my location was made so much easier thanks to you. The dormancy tips you have in some videos have me better prepared now 😅
I hope you start selling plants soon bc you already have a buyer waiting here buddy!! Keep up the fantastic work 🌱

[chestbuster]

I took your advice about ZeroWater pitchers from an older video. Best advice ever. I've had it for almost a year and it still produces 0 ppm water with its original filter.

[Peanutbox]

7 years ago when I was a kid I got a Venus fly trap it was my very first plant I have ever had and I didn’t really know much about plants to begin with so I had my mom help and that plant died faster than I thought a plant could die lol we put it in miracle gro so I got another one tried again and learned the right care I still have my 7 year old sarracenia and Venus fly trap today it’s no longer just one plant it’s 100s of plants! great care video and as always happy growing!

[lindaegnash]

I'm new to venus flytraps. I've tried several times to get your venus flytrap care sheet, with no luck....but I do enjoy your videos.

[DeclanGreen]

I live in Ireland and we don't have a lot of sunny weeks. I bought a T5 Fluorescent gro lamp to hopefully provide enough light for my VFT's.

[insecticidal]

I stopped acclimating them a long time ago. I realized that i was just delaying the inevitable. I realized that the plants acclimate faster by just putting them out in full sun and letting the sun scorch the old growth. The plant will be faster to put out strong growth. I’m actually in the middle of doing this and I’m documenting it on my page. Good info!!!

[klemmie]

We just got our first vft from California Carnivores! We've watched their videos and yours, and we're hoping we can do a good job with them! Every video you post is very informative and straightforward. Thank you! Wish us luck!

[JerzeyJoe]

I bought a Zero Water filtration system and test the water regularly before watering. I have hard water testing the water from the tap. The meter reads between 165-185 ppm. I put my water through the Zero Water Filtration, and the TDS meter reads at zero. My plants are alive and waiting for temperatures to rise so I can leave them out overnight. The temps are not stable yet here. Also, buying distilled water from the box store is getting pricey. Going with the Zero Water filtration system was a no-brainer to save money.

[jeremiahjones]

Right after talking about noticing one of my Venus dying I find this video love it

[marthanewsome]

I use cocopeat and pearlite. Water running through that stays the same as my rain water at 6ppm. I pop a couple small pieces of activated charcoal in the water tray to help prevent impurities building up. They all get rinsed through weekly. I used grow lights. They get 16 hours a day.

[StinaAndréasson]

My babies live in spaghnum, in direct southern facing window and thought it was doing pretty well considering. After watching this, though I'll set her under a grow light for the autumn, I dont know yet if she'll go dormant during the winter or not. We have persistent, extreme LACK of sun during October-May.

[melvinmolly]

So I live in the north east.. What do when the winter comes and the sun is limited, and I can't even leave it outside? Should I use a grow light?

[mgqdfrj]

Oh and I’m in Arizona growing a sundew and Venus flytrap. My advice for the 115 summer dry heat. Little to no afternoon sun is needed. 3-5pm is when it gets hottest here and at that point the plant is just cooking from my experience. I got a Walmart Venus fly trap to live for 3 years before I started buying from actual growers and every summer the 3pm-5:30pm sun just cooks them

[jolladevices]

The Zerowater is good in the beginning but into6 months the filter suddenly degrade to 150 ppm.
It's not filtering more even filtering 2 times the same water (I have 245ppm here).

I find that I will rely on rain water and using the ppm tester now

[JorgeBC]

Almost impulse bought then started having concerns about lighting, whats an ideal lighting situation/setup to allow the trap to flourish in an apartment? Didn’t see a video on this but found all your other videos super informative!

[mgqdfrj]

California carnivores has some good plants brought a B12 from them grew great it’s just now coming out of dormancy already growing huge. I also got a free little baby sundew that decided to sprout up this spring as well so I got a 2 in 1 very healthy plants very good shipping process

[CrystalLifeAfter]

Thank you so much for the great info on how to care for Venus fly traps. I feel like I would be totally lost without this video. I had to laugh because you know exactly what we have done or are doing, because we have no idea what we are doing.

[raymondblanchard]

Early last week, I found a small VFT at a grocery store. I young one with 1/2" and almost 3/4 inch traps and some tiny ones starting The following day at work, I researched them, and found out why the one I had many years ago died. Then after seeing some large ones in your video from Lowes, I picked up two larger ones like those in your vid. I began giving them an hour a day of sun. I fed each plant a young wasp each. After watching one of your 3yr old videos that did not say what time of year it was, I replanted them in an 8" plastic pot. . They each have a black trap and the little one, a couple whole black leaves. Only the young one seemed to be shocked a bit, even though it was in peat moss, The other two were in sphagnum, I removed all but about an inch of the long moss since I didn't want to tear any roots, being really stuck even though I dipped it in water. It is the first week in September and 90 degrees daily, with fall weather forecast for next week. I now know it's maybe a bit early for their dormancy since they came from California, , but maybe they should do fine? I live in Eastern WA State. I only use distilled and also RO water that has less than 5ppm from the local store. I handled them much more delicately than the guy at "California carnivores" who has been doing this for over 30 years. Prior to rescuing these 3, I ordered a B-52 from Predatory Plants, thinking that maybe after 3 years you had a store, and this might be yours, but maybe not. Then I saw a sale at Sarracenia store, so now I have 5 plants plus a Red Dragon on the way. LIke you, I couldn't pass up rescuing the ones from Lowes.

[marioortiz]

Love ur vids man and I agree with the light thing at 9:02 u can tell the plant needs light desperately. And if they would leave it outside for a week they’d know it needs more light. When do flytraps usually flower? Mine didn’t flower last year? Should I expect them to flower this year? I’m going to cut it but I’d like to know lol Thxs!