Expert: Sarracenia Northwest - 12/14/2010

Question
QUESTION: I want to put in a 10x7x2 ft. carnivorous plant bog garden next spring, but my water is full of chlorine and minerals. How do I add water to it?

ANSWER: Hi Michele,

Depending on what you want to do, this may be a deal breaker on whether or not you really want to put in a bog garden.  You didn't mention where you live, so I don't have any idea about how much rain you get.  In many areas of the country, rainfall might be adequate to take care of a bog garden with only supplemental watering needed.  If you're in a drier area, you would need to consider purchasing a reverse osmosis unit to supply you with enough water to water the bog garden. (It would give you great drinking water also.)  There are dozens of different types of units out there, so you would need to do a web search to see what would work for you.  At our nursery our well water is too hard, so we use a GE Merlin R.O. unit.  Here's a link to it:  http://www.amazon.com/Merlin-Reverse-Osmosis-Water-System/dp/B000G7KSO0  

You'll notice several negative reviews on the Merlin.  Most of these have to do with the way the unit is set up.  Merlins work best when they can be left on and operate for longer periods.  They will do 700 gallons per day.  For the money nothing else comes close.  If you wanted to install one in the home, other units might work better, but you'll get half to one quarter the water output.  We didn't use any of the typical attachments.  I just went to a hardware store and got adapters that let me connect it to a garden hose.  You do need a minimum of 40psi water pressure, but that is true for most units.

Good Growing!

Jeff Dallas
Sarracenia Northwest
http://www.cobraplant.com

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: I live in south Texas and we tend to have hot, dry summers.
I checked out the the R.O. unit you mentioned and that is really out of my budget. Do you have any other suggestions?

Answer
Hi Michele,

As I mentioned before, there are many different R.O. units out there, the Merlin is simply the one we use.

The bottom line is you need a source of low mineral water if your rainfall isn't adequate, or if your tapwater is too hard.  If an R.O. unit isn't in the budget, a bog garden may not be either.  We have to make decisions like this all the time in the nursery.  As a for instance, we grow very few lowland Nepenthes and Wooly sundews because they require minimum nighttime temperatures of 70 degrees year around.  It's just too expensive to heat the greenhouses that much in the winter, and we would have to charge too much for those plants.

Do you currently grow any Nepenthes?  They are much less sensitive to hard water, and should grow well in Texas.  They would need to be indoors during cool weather during the winter, but could be outside partially shaded during the summer.


Jeff Dallas
Sarracenia Northwest
http://www.cobraplant.com