About me

Hi there!

My name is Petra, I am the crazy plant lady.
I've grown plants all my life. I first encountered carnivorous plants as a kid, when I got a venus flytrap as a gift. Despite my best intentions the poor thing died very fast. Don't they all?

Years later, and with a collection of over 1000 other plants, I got seeds of Drosera binata for a second attempt. Oh, how I was happy when they sprouted and how I panicked about keeping them alive. Should I feed the tiny babies? When - and how - can I transplant them? I hooked up artificial lighting and fed them tiny bits of fish food with tweezers. Unnecessary panicking - yes, but that's hindsight.

Slowly and with help of a few more CP-seasoned friends I learned, most importantly, that CPs are very different to care for than other plants. In general, the 'easy' species only require light, rainwater, peat(moss) and peace to catch insects.

Very important lesson here for everyone interested in growing CP's: don't quit if your first CP dies. Read, ask, educate yourself on specific species, their ecology and natural environment. They are indeed tough, but they have their peculiarities. You can have a garden full of plants but they are not CPs, so you need to start from zero.

So, some 30 years on from that first venus flytrap we're registered as the first commercial CP growers in Slovenia. I also give lectures on CPs and tours of our greenhouse.

I feel that educating the public, especially children, about CPs is important - on one hand, yes, to introduce more people to the hobby, but on the other hand CPs are actually great just to grab the audience's attention for the underlying and more urgent cause. As many CPs are inhabitants of wetlands, they are great ambassadors for the importance and conservation of wetland ecosystems. And to say that wetlands are enormously important and seriousely endangered due to human activity, would both be understatements.