Squirrel Deterrence for Carnivorous Plants and Slow-Waking Purple Pitcher Plants

QUESTION: I have an issue with squirrels digging into the soil around the plants I have in pots. With my regular garden plants I use red pepper. Can this be used on carnivorous plants or is there something else that you can recommend? They have already dug up my VFTs once and I had to replant them.

ANSWER: Hi Patricia,

Red pepper is fine to use. They also hate sticky stuff, so devising something with flypaper, glue traps, etc. can sometimes be effective. Other solutions are going to be more expensive such as motion activated sprinklers, scatmats or sonic repellers. If you have neighbors that are feeding them, asking them to not feed them helps some too since they are often burying nuts in the peat.

Good Growing!

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

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

QUESTION: Thank you. Now that everything is waking up I would hate for squirrels to mess everything up. On that note everything is putting out new leaves or pitchers except the purple pitcher plant. It is showing no signs of waking up at all. Are these just slow to come out of dormancy or could there be a problem?

Answer

Hi Patricia,

Depending on what subspecies you have, purpurea's can be slow, especially if spring has been cool or erratic. Usually S. purpurea ssp. purpurea is the first to send up flowers, but pitchers take longer. S. purp. venosa and S. rosea want nights warm before they wake up. This is very different than plants like S. flava.

Good Growing!

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