Phalaenopsis Orchids

[Samskwatch]

Hi there,

Here is a nice thread to discuss about Phalaenopsis Orchids. I’ll start with this first guys :



All the flowers he had just dried out a couple weeks ago. You can see on the second picture that I expect new blooms. It has a nice foliage and a new leaf is growing out of the stem. The right bottom leaf is yellowish. Don’t know if I will be able to save it.

This plant was just reported from the original pot you can find them in. The old media was pure LFS. Now it is in a mix of LFS, coco bark and fir bark. Maybe the repot is the cause of this yellow leaf?

 

[Samskwatch]

I just acquired this little guys :



It was on a shelf at Canac in Drummondville. It had two dying flower spikes on it. So I decided I would try to save it. I reported it right away, clean up all the dead and rotten roots. I could only save one root!!! The one on the picture is the only one believe it or not. I bought it last week-end so let’s see what happens next!!

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

Coir from coconut can be very salty. I've killed orchids that way.

 

[Samskwatch]

Ok I'll be careful to flush it every time I water. This one was specifically for Orchids though, so I don't know if it is different from the usual stuff?

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

The coir I bought was for orchids. After they started dying (Phal's, by the way), I rinsed the coir with tap water and testedthe rinse water and the TDS was very high, much higher than Toronto tap water (~140). It took days of rinsing in tap water to get the rinse water down to the TDS of tap water, then I rinsed in distilled water for a few more days to get the rinse water TDS down to around 20 or so. Then it was good to use for orchids or even CP's. Test the coir now. If the coir is salty, the orchids are doomed.

 

[Samskwatch]

I see... Thanks for the advise, I will test that out tomorrow. It's getting late right now so tomorrow I'll do it!!

 

[Samskwatch]

Test is complete. 158ppm. My water is around 140ppm. I poured water in the pot and collected in a glass. What’s your thought?

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

The coconut sounds safe.

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

I found that the best indicator of health is fat, new silvery, green roots above the medium. As much as possible, mount the plant so that the roots are above/on the medium. Then you can spray with distilled water or occasional 50 TDS fertilizer solution. Roots under the surface eventually die.

 

[Samskwatch]

Yeah, they naturally grow on tree trunks or branches so the roots are use to be aerial and attached to something alive. As our media is most likely dead, this will cause a problem of building acidity in the soil and the roots will eventually rot. In the wild, the Orchid can stay alive as long as nothing happens to the tree it's on. Another point is that the crown will usually grow downward. We grow Phal upward in our pots but that's not how they naturally grow.

 

[Yukondave]

This is my only Phalaenopsis, P. lobbii. It came mounted this way.

 

[Samskwatch]

It's very nice!! . The montage is also demonstrating the way Orchid naturally grow. Got some nice looking leaves too!

 

[Samskwatch]

Here is a new Phal I got recently.

 

[Yukondave]

Here is a new Phal I got

Nice, it looks very healthy.

 

[Lloyd Gordon]

I always found the roots in the pots were not healthy.

 

[Dogrem]

My last Phalaenopsis was in a big pot (25 cm diameter) for 1 plant, and 100% bark.
I had to remove peat and coconut fiber to keep only a substrate capable of drying between watering.
The roots should not be too wet or rotten.
And you have to change the bark every 2 or 3 years I think.

but I agree with @Lloyd Gordon to keep the roots bare (but it requires a greenhouse or a tropical terrarium).

 

[Samskwatch]

Well, when the media starts to brake down, it’s acidity raises. That will get the roots to rot. When you buy an orchid, unless buying from a skilled nursery, you’re almost sure the media is old and already started to decompose.

Also, as an epiphitic specie, Phalaenopsis is not naturally growing roots in the ground but rather grower on a tree trunk or branch. I agree that you need to be careful with the root system inside the media.

 

[ellsie]

@Samskwatch, have you tried to cross pollinate your Phalaenopsis orchids? It's fun and easy to do!
Although, once you pollinate the orchid flower, it quickly wilts. So, before you attempt this, you might want to enjoy the bloom for a bit first

 

[Samskwatch]

I did try it once but it didn’t succeed. Even though, I gathered information on how to sow orchid seeds and the only viable way to do it is via a lab or LFH.

Plus, many Phal you find on the market are complex hybrid, like very complex. Most of them are infertiles so even with proper pollination technic, you won’t get any seeds.

Right now, I prefer to look at their beautiful flowers but I would sure give pollination another time in my life and send the seed pod to Willy if he wants to give it a try.

 

[Samskwatch]

Got this baby not long ago and when I bought it, it had no flowers on it. All the spikes were removed. But it had a Keiki attached to the stem and new grow points as well.

I did a repot. I really like to do that soon after I get a new Orchid. Get rid of the old media (you never know what happened before with it), sterilize the roots with H2O2 and make some breathing holes all around the pot. This time, I repoted the mom the classic way and repoted the keiki in a semi mounted position.