Hey Everyone! I'm The Newest Orchid Geek In The House!

[Kimberly Ann]

Hello to all you orchid geeks! I'm new to this forum and I'm also a new orchid geek/caregiver/grower/gardener/lover ...My first orchid was given to me by my boyfriend this past Valentine's Day (a lovely gift), a pink/purple-speckled Phalaenopsis, and I loved it so much that I purchased three more a few months later. The other three are also Phalaenopsis, one being another pink/purple-speckled one, another a light green one, and the last one a beautiful white with a pink/purple lip (is that what the center part is called?). I live in California, and keep them all indoors out of direct light. They were all in bloom when I got them, and now only two of them are. I got advice about caring for them from my grandmother, who has a collection growing outdoors in a tree in Florida. She told me to mist the entire plants with water everyday and fertilize about once a month. I have been misting them everyday, but haven't had the chance to fertilize yet, although I did finally buy some. My grandma told me that once the flowers fall off and when the stem turns brown and brittle, I should cut the stem at the base as close to the leaves as possible, but I have been getting conflicting info on the web. Some say to cut it halfway up, some say an inch up, some say 3 nodes up...I'm thinking I should just trust my grandma, since she's been successfully growing them for years, but I just want to make sure that's the way to do it. Two of my plants have lost all their flowers and the stems are brown (the leaves are green and healthy). What do you guys think? Also, should I start fertilizing just the flowering plants once a month? Or do I fertilize all of them regardless of whether they have flowers or not?

[brookn]

Hi and welcome. The adage around here is fertilize weakly weekly, just search fertilizer and you should find your answers. I did not fertilize my blooming phals very much maybe once every two weeks to four weeks. I know there are varying opinions. Misting is okay, but be careful of the crown or you may get rot, never mist late in the day so that they have plenty of time to dry out by nightfall. I rarely get the crown wet on my phals, and if I do, I dry them immediately to avoid rot.

[Anton]

Welcome to the "Family" Kimberly.

Well there a couple of trains of thought about where to cut your Phals, and both are correct. I personally have cut one of mine to the base another I have cut down to about the 3rd node.

The Phal which I cut right back was because the stem had died right back, so there was no reason to leave it long. My present one a Phal Pulchra which looks different than the usual Phal has healthy stems, so I have left them relatively long.

By leaving them long quite often they will flower along the stem again.

With Phals, water them in the morning letting them dry out by night time, they don't like to be too wet over night. Again with fertilizing you will probably get several ways of doing it.

The way I do it is off flowering period as you mentioned around once a month weakly, with a full flush through about every third month to get rid of excess salt build up from the fertilizer. During flowering season weakly, weekly, and flush through about every third week.

Let the potting mix almost dry out between waterings, as mentioned, they don't like to be too wet.

Hope this gets you started, others will come on board and add their two petals worth.

[fred]

Hi Kimberly Ann

Welcome to the forum
I hope you enjoy your stay here with all of us orchidgeeks
we have lots of knowledge here for you to read and the members are an awesome bunch of geeks also full of knowledge to help you with growing your orchids.

so any questions you have dont be to scared to ask them as we are all here to help.

happy chatting

[Tobi]

Hi and welcome Kimberly. As you can see we have alot of wonderful helpful
people here. I'm sure you will enjoy your stay with us.

[prisana]

Hi Kimberly, welcome to the forum.
You said your GM is in Florida and is growing them in a tree, that's probably why she's spraying them everyday..that's especially true if they are mounted and not hung from a tree. I have my phals ( and all orchids ) outside and I don't mist them everyday unless they are on a mount. But I don't know what the weather is like in CA so you might have to do reserch on growing outside in your area.

Cutting a flowering spike all off will give your plant a chance to rest and it will have bigger and more blooms next time around. Cutting down to the node right under the last flower "may" give you more blooms without having to wait for a new spike. That doesn't happen with all of my phals, namely this one that had tons of blooms during blooming season...it simply ran out of energy to branch out and bloom again. You can also wait until the spike is completely dead and dry and then cut it off all the way like GM said...this way you wouldn't have to sterilize the cutting tool.
Good luck and happy growing.

[pikevi]

Hello Kimberly Ann, Welcome to the forum.

[PhalPal]

Hi Kimberly - Here is a link to another thread regarding the cutting or not cutting of faded spikes. Hope it helps; if not, keep asking! It's okay.
Should I cut the spike?