[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

For bark or coconut chips, put your finger on top and press down. If your finger goes in (being careful not to stab roots with finger nails), it is time to repot. If it meets a great deal of resistance, you can wait another year. I would not go bigger in pot size.

I don't like pots with slits on the side, especially clay pots with slits on the sides. Orchids may grow well in such a pot, but when it is time to repot, you may have trouble getting the plant out of the pot. If roots adhere to the sides of clay pots, a remedy to do the least damage is to take a sterilized knife and run it around the inside of the pot to free the roots from the clay with the least damage. With roots growing out the slits, this will take off a lot of roots. A plastic pot on the other hand can be flexed to free up the roots from the pot with zero damage.