Clubs offer a new plant each month.

Byline: The Register-Guard

If you want to have a different carnivorous plant every month, all you have to do is contact the guys at Sarracenia Northwest (www.cobraplant .com).

You'll get 12 of the more than 600 species of carnivorous plants on the planet, and if you take good care of them, you could still have the whole dozen a year later, co-owner Jacob Farin says.

There are two monthly clubs you can choose from: the "Grown in the USA Club" or the "Tropical Plant Club." All plants are shipped in 3-inch pots.

With the former club, you'll get a scarlet belle hybrid in January, a doodle bug hybrid in February, your Venus flytrap in May, all the way to a purple pitcher in December.

The latter club gives you tropical houseplants such as cape sundews, Mexican butterworts, pygmy sundews and Asian pitchers.

Sarracenia Northwest's plant of the month club was recently featured in The Washington Post as one of several "offbeat" Christmas gifts that keep on giving throughout the year.

Farin and Jeff Dallas, who started the business in 1995 by selling plants at the Portland Saturday Market, say they have created a loyal following of collectors and growers of meat-eating plants throughout Oregon and beyond.

Farin, who started with the company part time in 1998 while completing his residency as a family physician, left his practice in 2002 to do the carnivorous plant thing full time. The two have co-authored a book titled, "Secrets to Growing Beautiful Carnivorous Plants for Your Home and Garden" and are recognized carnivorous plant experts at AllExperts .com, a Web site where questions are answered from growers all over the world.

They also produce an "eBook" that "dispels a lot of the myths that are out there," Farin says.

- Mark Baker