We are starting to get longer days as we break out of winter now. I got out there and saw that about a half dozen of my carnivorous plants have been invaded by this spiky weed. I tried downloading an app to find out what kind of weed it is but none of the would run for some reason. In this first photo, I am pointing at the Drosera that used to fill the space above its mossy soil. You cannot see the Drosera very well but it still has its flower stalk above it. That means, if the seeds fell, that there will be babies under their mother's foliage.
Last post, I said I was having troubling finding anything green out here in the garden, but I have to amend that statement before I pull all of the greenery (Weeds) out of my planters. This next one it completely surrounded by the weeds. I had run into stinging nettle weeds last summer and I learned very quickly not to just grab and pull.
Let's get back to our first subject. Here is what I would be pulling on if I were to use my hands. Dandelions have similar spiked hair on them but this one is full of it. Let's get the pliers, which are good at getting below the soil to the root of the matter.
If you look to the right of where the pliers are, you will see the root system of the carnivorous plant that we are trying to save. I will pull slowly so that I do not take up the adult Drosera.
I grabbed an unoccupied pot and used it like a trash can.
The first one is clean and ready to take in some sunshine tomorrow as the sun gets closer to the plants every day that it swings past my terrace.
This one is done. I have some babies that are growing from seeds dropped over wintter
Here's another one that was completely taken over. I have to repot those baby plants before I add moss to this pot. It is normal to have to add moss. They sprout new leaves on the top and the older ones, at the bottom, get covered with moss and they become roots.
The next target is the plant that is in the background of the above photo. See the side by side, before and after, of that one below.
These plant take a beating over winter even though we don't get snow and rarely get below 45 degrees F, but the Drosera plants have a strategy. They pull all the life out of their branches and store it in bulbs under ground. Then when spring is in the air (like it is now), the green starts to show.
Some people who buy these wondrous plants might think that they have killed it when the plant retreats in the off-season, but they come back as you can see above. The ones that are able to catch insects all winter long do not have to retreat, though they do shrink a bit. I mean, they are not as bushy as in summer.
