Question
I've been repotting my sarrecenia with one part peat to one part perlite soil. Whenever it rains or water is poured on top of the repotted plants the soil separates and washes away. I've tried compressing the soil and packing it more tightly into the pots and squishing excess water out of the soil but it doesn't seem to help much. Do you have any suggestions on how to remedy the soil washing away?

Answer
Hi Adam,

Good to hear from you.  There's a simple solution for this.  When you pot your plants up leave about 1/2" of space to the top of the pot.  Top dress the pot with pea gravel to the point where you can't see any soil.  This stops the splash erosion.  Also, don't let plants sit too deep in water trays.  This also seems to make the soil washing away problem worse.  My preferred pea gravel to use of rainbow rock.  You can get bags of it from Oregon Decorative Rock and other landscape suppliers.

Good Growing!

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