Don't mean to butt in, but many people mount their orchids to simulate to an extent how they grow in the wild. A high percentage of orchids in nature grow on trees, so to simulate this, many people will "mount" their plants on pieces of wood or occasionally other similar materals. Generally you need to have them growing in an area with lots of humidity and water them more often to do this. Someone in our orchid society has all of his phals mounted - in order to make this successful he soaks the wood once per week and mists the roots every day. Here is a great photo of how phals grow in the wild on trees -
http://forum.theorchidsource.com/cgi...=004259#000000 mike