Venus Flytraps are reportedly very simple to propagate using leaf pullings. A leaf pulling is similar to a cutting, but a small part of the rhizome must be attached to the leaf in order for it to be successful.
I gently pull a leaf downwards which removes part of the white rhizome, and I plant it in sphagnum peat moss mixed with sand. I treat this leaf pulling the same as an adult plant and often just plant it in the same pot as the plant that I took the cutting from.
Once the plantlets have grown I divide them into their own pot. I don’t use rooting hormones or grow lights or heat mats or anything special.
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| VFT leaf pulling sprouting many baby plants, each bump makes one new plant |
I find leaf pullings to be a bit hit and miss, incorrect temperature or sunlight seem to be the difference between 100% success and complete failure. I also find that some cultivars grow well from leaf pulling while I have difficulty getting others to take from a leaf pulling no matter what I do. Genetics has a part to play here.
Whenever I repot or divide my plants I sometimes take a leaf pulling and sometimes I will pull off a damaged leaf and try to use that. For me, the leaf pullings that are successful usually provide me with one new plant. Sometimes I get two or three new plants from one leaf pulling. I normally get a few plants from each flower stalk cutting.
This past spring I divided some of my plants and took a few leaf pullings. I was planning on selling the plants, and because I didn't have many spare pots I left the leaf pullings in the pots with them until the divided plants were large enough for sale. The day before the plant sale I removed any surviving leaf pullings to put in another pot and was surprised at what I saw.
Most of the venus fly trap leaf pullings had either died off or produced a single plant, some had two new plants. These new plants mostly arose from the rhizome or very low on the leaf near the rhizome.
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| Leaf pulling was growing in this pot with a larger plant |
One Venus Flytrap variety produced numerous new plants, they were produced most of the way along the stem of the leaf and not just from the rhizome. One leaf started to produce well over a dozen new plants. These are the first leaf pullings I have successfully taken from this variety, so I am not sure if this excessive production of plants per leaf pulling is common in this variety or if I just got lucky. This is a particularly vigorous clone, so it may be possible that they commonly throw this many plants per leaf pulling.
I have never seen so many new plants arise from one venus flytrap leaf pulling. These were the first two leaf pullings I have taken from this variety, so perhaps it is common to this clone. I guess next Spring when I take more leaf pullings I will find out.
As I dug up these leaf pullings and moved them before they were established I half expected to either die or for only a few of the plantlets to continue developing. Often cuttings and the like do not take kindly to being disturbed until they are more established. So far this does not seem to be the case, and both of these successful leaf pullings appear to have survived and the plantlets are continuing to develop.
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| The other leaf pulling came from this pot |
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| Two leaf pullings replanted in this pot |
I sometimes get a pot of tiny plants that I can care for while they are growing larger. Keeping tiny plants in one pot makes it simple to care for them. I put the successful leaf pullings in one of these pots. You can see in the picture above that it already had some tiny plants as well as a flower stalk cutting.
The picture below shows that both of those leaf pullings survived and are producing many new baby venus fly trap plants. You can also see the flower stalk cutting (bottom right) successfully made new plants.
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| This pot has tiny plants growing out from various cuttings and things |
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