I've become a huge fan of semi-hydro over the past year.
I've planted all of my 50 house plants into LECA (expanded clay pellets) or pon (special gravel mix consisting of lava rock, pumice, and zeolithe), and they're doing absolutely great. (Too great if you ask me. They've become a weed in my apartment ๐)
Recently, I got into carnivorous plants.
Literally everyone is growing them in turf/peat or moss based substrates, and nothing else. As we all might know, those substrates not only attract pests (fungus gnats, etc.), but are not that great for the environment.
This is why I came up with the idea of using hydroponics.
As soon as I began researching, I've come to the conclusion, that there's sadly pretty much no overlap between the hydroponics community and carnivorous plants community.
So, I started an experiment.
I've put my just-bought Sarracenia, previous in soil, into pon with a very small grain diameter. This keeps the plants very moist, way moister than LECA would, at least the big marbles.
I soaked the granules with distilled water a few times, and then added a drop of diluted phosphoric acid to a pH of 4,5 and EC of 0,1 mS.
This is how the roots look after not only one week: 
And the plant itself: 
Pretty good if you ask me!
Sadly, Sarracenias need to hibernate, and this one started going crispy even in the store, which is apparently normal, so I've put it into my cold garage for a month or two.
I also started growing Drosera and Sarracenia from seed, but they didn't germinate yet. I got a lot of different seeds from a hobbyist, but growing CPs from seeds is a huge pain from what I've read.
Here's a picture of my seedling/ cutting station:
I will make a post about the station soon!
I also sew a few of them directly into the pot and covered it with foil.
In theory, the combination of fine substrate with high water level should provide the plants with enough moisture, while also letting the roots get exposed to a lot of oxygen, which keeps them very healthy.
But swamp plants are just different maybe, I don't know. Let's see...
And, last but not least, I bought two Nepenthes a few days ago. I already placed one of them into LECA (8-16 mm).
They apparently grow similar to orchids, and not like swamp growing plants like venus fly traps or Drosera. So, they rather need a airy substrate, normal pH (about 6) and even tolerate fertilizer.
They looked like this when I bought them:
I will keep you all updated!
Tags for search engines: LECA, hydroponics, hydro, semi hydro, carnivorous plants, VFT, Sarracenia, Drosera, Dionaea, Nepenthes, fertilizer, experiment, inorganic media, peat alternative, pumice, Seramis, pon
Fun experiment!
The Nepenthes sound like they could do well, the simpler hydroponics systems for home use are very good at airating the solution, and with the nutrient density you can leave most of the roots in he air. Also, there's the Ebb & Flow method that could give even more air.
What worries me a little is that a lot of hydroponics is trial and error, with failure almost guaranteed as the experiment goes on. It's tough to manually compensate for nutrient needs of different growth cycles, keep the area perfectly pest free, and without root rot, even if you dial in the air/nutrient/npk/light/pH/variance and manage to keep it running without hitch.
Are you willing to lose a whole lot of plants?
I don't know about the carni-plant community, but chilli and orchid enthusiasts are typically not very willing to lose their plants.
A way to control how out of whack the system can get is to switch out all of it every two weeks (or whatever you can manage to keep stable). Dump out all the solution, clean everything, check the roots, document the status if you're being thorough, and finally refill and reset again.
Best of luck! Looking forward to seeing more of your experiment as it goes on, please keep us updated!
My Grandfather is a Orchid enthusiast and any Plant that dosent perform gets the Windowsill place in the Toilet. Most Plants start getting niceley looking again, we joke that is because they want too flee the smell.
Is that a thing? I remember my dad had 2 orchids in his toilet. They did very well.
Not that i now of, it was more to get bad looking Plants out of the living room.
But maybe there is a Connection, or its the Humidity from the shower or or or who knows...
Maybe a combination of that weird milky glas in bathrooms and hunidity. We need more data!
NOOOOOOO, FRISBEE NOOOOO! You have enough projects and i don't have a window in my bathroom
But we are onto something big! I can almost feel the first botanic nobel price in my hands!
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