Bladderwort
Bladderwort
Utricularia spp.
❦ ❧ ❦
Difficulty — IntermediateThe most accomplished hunter in my collection is also the one you are least likely to notice. Above the soil, the Bladderwort offers nothing more alarming than a low carpet of tiny, grass-like leaves and, in season, a scattering of little flowers as delicate as any orchid. Below, out of sight, she sets hundreds of minute bladder-traps that spring open in a fraction of a millisecond and swallow whatever microscopic creature brushes their trigger hairs. It is among the fastest motions in the whole plant kingdom, and she performs it entirely in the dark. The kinds I keep on the windowsill are the terrestrial bladderworts, which grow in wet soil rather than open water.
Notes on Cultivation
☀Light
Bright light, with a few hours of gentle morning sun if you can manage it. A sunny windowsill or a spot beneath a grow light for twelve to fourteen hours a day suits her well. Too little light and she will keep her leaves but withhold her flowers.
❦Water
This is the one rule that must never be bent: use only distilled water, reverse-osmosis water, or rainwater. The minerals in ordinary tap water build up in her soil and will slowly poison her. She likes her feet wet at all times, so I stand her pot in a shallow tray kept topped up with an inch or so of water and never let it run dry.
☁Humidity
She is happiest at 50 percent or more. The water tray beneath her helps a great deal, and a clear dome or a terrarium will keep her lush through a dry winter. Most will settle into ordinary room air if you accustom them to it gradually.
✵Temperature
Comfortable room warmth between 60 and 85 Fahrenheit suits the windowsill kinds perfectly. Keep her from cold glass in January and from sitting in a baking-hot tray of water in high summer.
❧Soil
Nothing rich, ever. A mix of plain sphagnum peat with perlite or washed silica sand, with no fertilizer or compost added, is what she knows from her native bogs. Potting soil will kill her. Use a plastic or glazed pot, as bare terracotta can leach minerals into the mix over time.
❀Fertilizing
None whatsoever. She catches her own suppers, and every feed I might offer would only burn her roots. Of all my specimens, she is the one who most wants to be left to her own devices.
✿Propagation
Division is simplicity itself. Lift a small clump from the edge of the pot, press it onto the surface of fresh, wet peat mix, and keep it humid. She will soon creep outward to fill her new home. For her I set the clear cup of Fluval Stratum aside, since an aquarium soil rich in nutrients is precisely what a carnivore cannot abide.
Field Observations
Do not be troubled that you never see her traps at work. A thickening carpet of leaves and a flush of flowers are all the proof you need that she is dining well underground.
She is perfectly content crowded into a small, shallow pot, and looks rather charming beside the other bog dwellers. She has no reputation for harming pets, though she is not on the common safety lists either way, so I would still rather Winston did not graze on her.
— faithfully recorded by Mr. Phileas Plant
✿Have one of these at home?
Mr. Phileas now travels in coat pockets — both kinds, as of August. The Plantry app identifies your plants from a photo, keeps care notes like these with you, and lets you ask him anything — free, on iPhone and Android. Step into the greenhouse →
