Bruce (aka dionea@nando.net) and I took a trip to the Green Swamp
in SE North Carolina last Thursday (Aug. 17th). I brought along a
pH meter in order to follow up on my conversation with Yassir
about what the pH of typical CP soil is, but all I learned was
that my pH meter was broken :( Fortunately we met two Nature
Conservancy workers there who told us that the NC's tests in the
swamp found a soil pH between 4.5 and 5.0.
Once I gave up trying to get my pH meter to work I saw plenty of
CPs which more than made up for my disappointment. We saw several
healthy colonies of S. rubra and plenty of Dionaea; in fact the
only plants that seem to be suffering from the heat and dry
weather were the S. flavas. I did notice that only two of all the
Sarracenia plants I saw were putting out new pitchers. The swamp
is quite dry. The nearby city of Wilmington, which normally gets
7 inches of rain by this time in August, has gotten barely 1/4 of
an inch.
Phil
pjs20347@glaxo.com