Expert: Sarracenia Northwest - 4/14/2011

Question
Hello SNW, I live in Northern Utah and currently we're having really strong winds where I live.  My family's sarracenia Daina's Delight, Leucophylla 'tarnok', and Rubra got blown away about 10-24 inches away from where my son has placed them.  My front yard has an area where there are little rocks covering the area fully, and a little flower garden in front.  When the sarracenias got blown away the rubra and daina's delight landed in the rocky area on their sides and the leucophylla landed in the flower garden on its side.  I would guess that they've been like that for at least two hours since the weather forecast said the winds would start later in the afternoon.  I thought my son would get home early enough to fill their trays with water again so they could withstand the wind, but he got home a little later than I expected so they were blown over.  I inspected them and the rubra and daina's delight pitchers, from last growing season, were okay, but the leucophylla's single pitcher, from last growing season, was a little torn up so I just cut it, but anyway before they fell over they started to show signs of growth.  So my question to you guys is will they be okay for spring?

Answer
Yes, they'll be perfectly OK.  I take it that the plants simply got blown on their sides while still in their pots.  They're fine being out of the water tray for the time they did.  In early season, these sort of things happen.  

Don't worry about any of the pitchers from last season.  If anything, you can clip them all off.  We do that in early spring at our nursery.  This allows sunlight to reach the new growth and help the plants in spring.  We're also very early in the growing season, so any damage to the new growth is really inconsequential.  Your plant will have plenty of time to recover before next winter's dormancy.  When the weather warms up, your plant will produce more pitchers.

I recommend watching our monthly podcast so you could see how much we clip back our Sarracenia:
http://www.cobraplant.com/videos

Good growing!
Jacob Farin