I've recently acquired insect eating plants. (1 Dionea
muscipula--venus fly trap & 1 sarracena pururea---bog plant) There
seems to be quite a lot of google entries concerning their water
requirements, but what I'm looking for is more on the lines of just
what can they eat and how much of it?
I mean, what with the hot weather n all, we have to stuff the chicken
leftovers into the freezer until bin day to prevent us from having a
stinky dustbin. So, just how many such plants would I need to save
freezer space (& save electricity, thereby aiding the enviornment)
Like, how are they on chicken bones? Or the fat from a slice of ham?
Just wondering.
Back to flies. The venus fly trap could best be described as slow to
catch. I have to swat the flies first to stun them. Place on trap and
wait for fly to wiggle, but sometimes it wiggles and has walked-out
before the trap closes in.
I guess I'd have to take a mallet to the chiken bones first.

In article om,
a.c. wrote:
I've recently acquired insect eating plants. (1 Dionea
muscipula--venus fly trap & 1 sarracena pururea---bog plant) There
seems to be quite a lot of google entries concerning their water
requirements, but what I'm looking for is more on the lines of just
what can they eat and how much of it?
I mean, what with the hot weather n all, we have to stuff the chicken
leftovers into the freezer until bin day to prevent us from having a
stinky dustbin. So, just how many such plants would I need to save
freezer space (& save electricity, thereby aiding the enviornment)
Like, how are they on chicken bones? Or the fat from a slice of ham?
Just wondering.

What you want to grow is the Greater Gromboolian Cow-Muncher. Only
the very biggest ones can eat even a calf, and they take a century
to grow to that size, so using a young one for the purpose you
envisage should work.

It is believed that the oldest and largest one in the UK is in the
Home Office, and is used to threaten Home Secretaries who show signs
of a liberal disposition. Well-behaved ones are allowed to feed it
with dissidents on special occasions, of course.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

In article om, a.c.
writes
I've recently acquired insect eating plants. (1 Dionea
muscipula--venus fly trap & 1 sarracena pururea---bog plant) There
seems to be quite a lot of google entries concerning their water
requirements, but what I'm looking for is more on the lines of just
what can they eat and how much of it?
I mean, what with the hot weather n all, we have to stuff the chicken
leftovers into the freezer until bin day to prevent us from having a
stinky dustbin. So, just how many such plants would I need to save
freezer space (& save electricity, thereby aiding the enviornment)
Like, how are they on chicken bones? Or the fat from a slice of ham?
Just wondering.

:-)
Cover your whole garden with them and you might begin to make an
impression - that is if you can stop them gorging themselves on flies
;-)

Assuming this isn't simply a wind-up, you may need to tackle your
problem at source. The obvious is to scale down your chicken cooking so
there are fewer left overs ;-) This probably isn't your scene, but if
you boil up the left overs for a while, you make a good stock which can
be frozen for later use in gravy, soup, casseroles etc and save you a
fortune in Oxo cubes, and the boiled scraps are much less smelly.
Otherwise, wrap each batch of leftovers in one or two supermarket
carrier bags and tie the top - stops the smells and raiding dogs.
Chop the ham fat into small pieces and let the birds have it.

Back to flies. The venus fly trap could best be described as slow to
catch. I have to swat the flies first to stun them. Place on trap and
wait for fly to wiggle, but sometimes it wiggles and has walked-out
before the trap closes in.

They have an elaborate trigger mechanism involving two or three hairs -
makes sure it closes for live flies and not bits of dead leaf etc that
have blown in.

But if it's closing slowly, it may simply be that you've been
overfeeding it. You don't need to feed it - in fact you shouldn't feed
it as a routine. It will catch all it needs by itself.

--
Kay
"Do not insult the crocodile until you have crossed the river"

The message
from Kay contains these words:

Assuming this isn't simply a wind-up, you may need to tackle your
problem at source. The obvious is to scale down your chicken cooking so
there are fewer left overs ;-) This probably isn't your scene, but if
you boil up the left overs for a while, you make a good stock which can
be frozen for later use in gravy, soup, casseroles etc and save you a
fortune in Oxo cubes, and the boiled scraps are much less smelly.

Not only that, but you get a stock that tastes like chicken/realfood,
instead of monosodium glutamate. If you chill it, the fat settles hard
at the top and can be lifted off. Very good for making herby dumplings
to go with your chicken soup.

The boiled scraps after you've made the stock, with the bones taken
out, are a gourmet meal to dogs and cats. (The bones come out very
easily after the boiling). Now all you have left is a very tiny
collection of clean boiled bones. This is a gourmet meal to any plant
you happen to be planting :-)

Janet

The message
from (Nick Maclaren) contains these words:

What you want to grow is the Greater Gromboolian Cow-Muncher. Only
the very biggest ones can eat even a calf, and they take a century
to grow to that size, so using a young one for the purpose you
envisage should work.

It is believed that the oldest and largest one in the UK is in the
Home Office, and is used to threaten Home Secretaries who show signs
of a liberal disposition. Well-behaved ones are allowed to feed it
with dissidents on special occasions, of course.

That's why they gave Blunkett the job - in the hope that he would
blunder into it, but luckily for him, he had a loyal dog...

--
Rusty
Emus to: horrid dot squeak snailything zetnet point co full-stop uk
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

On Wed, 29 Jun 2005 14:51:39 +0100, Janet Baraclough stood forth and
addressed the huddled masses thus;

The message
from Kay contains these words:

Assuming this isn't simply a wind-up, you may need to tackle your
problem at source. The obvious is to scale down your chicken cooking so
there are fewer left overs ;-) This probably isn't your scene, but if
you boil up the left overs for a while, you make a good stock which can
be frozen for later use in gravy, soup, casseroles etc and save you a
fortune in Oxo cubes, and the boiled scraps are much less smelly.

Not only that, but you get a stock that tastes like chicken/realfood,
instead of monosodium glutamate. If you chill it, the fat settles hard
at the top and can be lifted off. Very good for making herby dumplings
to go with your chicken soup.

The boiled scraps after you've made the stock, with the bones taken
out, are a gourmet meal to dogs and cats. (The bones come out very
easily after the boiling). Now all you have left is a very tiny
collection of clean boiled bones. This is a gourmet meal to any plant
you happen to be planting :-)

Are the bones clean enough by that stage that they won't attract
foxes? I've avoided using bonemeal in the garden as I don't want the
local foxes digging up everything in the vicinty of bonemeal.

JB

The message
from JB contains these words:

On Wed, 29 Jun 2005 14:51:39 +0100, Janet Baraclough stood forth and
addressed the huddled masses thus;

The message
from Kay contains these words:

Assuming this isn't simply a wind-up, you may need to tackle your
problem at source. The obvious is to scale down your chicken cooking so
there are fewer left overs ;-) This probably isn't your scene, but if
you boil up the left overs for a while, you make a good stock which can
be frozen for later use in gravy, soup, casseroles etc and save you a
fortune in Oxo cubes, and the boiled scraps are much less smelly.

Not only that, but you get a stock that tastes like chicken/realfood,
instead of monosodium glutamate. If you chill it, the fat settles hard
at the top and can be lifted off. Very good for making herby dumplings
to go with your chicken soup.

The boiled scraps after you've made the stock, with the bones taken
out, are a gourmet meal to dogs and cats. (The bones come out very
easily after the boiling). Now all you have left is a very tiny
collection of clean boiled bones. This is a gourmet meal to any plant
you happen to be planting :-)

Are the bones clean enough by that stage that they won't attract
foxes? I've avoided using bonemeal in the garden as I don't want the
local foxes digging up everything in the vicinty of bonemeal.

Do you know anyone that has actually happened to? I don't, though I've
heard it passed round often. It may just be one of those urban myths.

There's decades of chicken bones (and roadkill and dead pets and
bonemeal ) buried under plants in our last garden, and none of it was
ever dug up, even though there were lots of foxes around. Our dogs have
never bothered either.

Janet.

The message
from JB contains these words:

Are the bones clean enough by that stage that they won't attract
foxes? I've avoided using bonemeal in the garden as I don't want the
local foxes digging up everything in the vicinty of bonemeal.

No. And rats will dig them up.

I planted a grape vine over a big pile of (mainly) chicken and bacon
hock bones, and despite their being a couple of feet down, the local
rats started a bone mine.

Mind you, with the AirArms S310, the grape vine is flourishing on a
second-helping of rats...

--
Rusty
Emus to: horrid dot squeak snailything zetnet point co full-stop uk
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

Jaques d'Alltrades wrote:
The message
from (Nick Maclaren) contains these words:

What you want to grow is the Greater Gromboolian Cow-Muncher.
Only
the very biggest ones can eat even a calf, and they take a century
to grow to that size, so using a young one for the purpose you
envisage should work.

It is believed that the oldest and largest one in the UK is in the
Home Office, and is used to threaten Home Secretaries who show
signs
of a liberal disposition. Well-behaved ones are allowed to feed
it
with dissidents on special occasions, of course.

That's why they gave Blunkett the job - in the hope that he would
blunder into it, but luckily for him, he had a loyal dog...

Maybe we now know exactly what _really_ happened to Stonehouse.

--
Mike.

The message
from "Mike Lyle" contains these words:

Maybe we now know exactly what _really_ happened to Stonehouse.

We do.

What isn't generally known is the the Mary Celeste had a mature Dionea pura

The message
from Jaques d'Alltrades contains
these words:

The message
from JB contains these words:

Are the bones clean enough by that stage that they won't attract
foxes? I've avoided using bonemeal in the garden as I don't want the
local foxes digging up everything in the vicinty of bonemeal.

No. And rats will dig them up.

I planted a grape vine over a big pile of (mainly) chicken and bacon
hock bones, and despite their being a couple of feet down, the local
rats started a bone mine.

Had you cleaned off all the meat, or left those gristly bits in the
hocks, and how deep did they have to sink the mineshaft?

Janet

In article ,
Janet Baraclough wrote:

Are the bones clean enough by that stage that they won't attract
foxes? I've avoided using bonemeal in the garden as I don't want the
local foxes digging up everything in the vicinty of bonemeal.

Do you know anyone that has actually happened to? I don't, though I've
heard it passed round often. It may just be one of those urban myths.

It is. There is a grain of truth behind it, as with the ant and
aphid myth, but it has been amplified from an observation of
occasional behaviour and a guideline not to tempt fate into a
religious tenet.

There's decades of chicken bones (and roadkill and dead pets and
bonemeal ) buried under plants in our last garden, and none of it was
ever dug up, even though there were lots of foxes around. Our dogs have
never bothered either.

Heck, I just heave bones and stock residue on the top of my heap,
and neither rats nor foxes bother with it. By the time you have
made stock with something, or gnawed the meat off the bones the
way my family do, there isn't enough left to interest anything
except a starving rat. People who put half-eaten legs of lamb
onto the heap may have more trouble.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

In article ,
Jaques d'Alltrades wrote:
The message
from JB contains these words:

Are the bones clean enough by that stage that they won't attract
foxes? I've avoided using bonemeal in the garden as I don't want the
local foxes digging up everything in the vicinty of bonemeal.

No. And rats will dig them up.

I planted a grape vine over a big pile of (mainly) chicken and bacon
hock bones, and despite their being a couple of feet down, the local
rats started a bone mine.

Are you sure that they were after the bones? I have had rats in
my heap from next door's rubbish tip, and they completely ignored
such things in favour of the worms. However, the two are correlated,
as buried bones etc. do cause a concentration of some types of worm
that prefer a high-protein mix for their feed.

Mind you, with the AirArms S310, the grape vine is flourishing on a
second-helping of rats...

Seems reasonable. I am planning to buy a Gamo for the pigeons.
My ancient BSA jumps far too hard as the spring goes off to be
accurate at the distance I need.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

The message
from (Nick Maclaren) contains these words:

I planted a grape vine over a big pile of (mainly) chicken and bacon
hock bones, and despite their being a couple of feet down, the local
rats started a bone mine.

Are you sure that they were after the bones? I have had rats in
my heap from next door's rubbish tip, and they completely ignored
such things in favour of the worms. However, the two are correlated,
as buried bones etc. do cause a concentration of some types of worm
that prefer a high-protein mix for their feed.

They dragged the bones out and carried them some distance. And they
completely ignore my compost heap, which is squirming with worms.

Mind you, with the AirArms S310, the grape vine is flourishing on a
second-helping of rats...

Seems reasonable. I am planning to buy a Gamo for the pigeons.
My ancient BSA jumps far too hard as the spring goes off to be
accurate at the distance I need.

Come over with the BSA sometime. I used to knock pigeons over with my
BSA Cadet Major.

thinks

Come to think of it - where *IS* my Cadet Major?

/thinks

--
Rusty
Emus to: horrid dot squeak snailything zetnet point co full-stop uk
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

Nick Maclaren wrote:
In article ,
Jaques d'Alltrades wrote:
[...]
Mind you, with the AirArms S310, the grape vine is flourishing on
a
second-helping of rats...

Seems reasonable. I am planning to buy a Gamo for the pigeons.
My ancient BSA jumps far too hard as the spring goes off to be
accurate at the distance I need.

Huh! Sometimes I hate you non-varifocal guys.

--
Mike.