Mixing mediums.

[Winterwhite]

Hi folks,
All is reasonably well in my orchid world. I have learned that you order nothing during the winter season and wait until the temperatures are reasonably safe before ordering. Just about all my spiked or blooming orchids that I ordered within the past two months have lost their spikes/blooms. They just dried up and turned brown.

But that is not my question. When I repotted or potted my bald root orchids, I actually mixed both a medium mix with spagnum moss. I am finding that the spagnum moss on top is kind of useless in that it just dries up and is not a good indication of the dampness deeper in the pot.

I was reading in the Ortho orchid book that you shouldn't mix mediums. Is that true and am I ok when I do. Sometimes I throw some on the bottom of a pot or maybe in the middle of a bark mix. Also, the green moss that some orchids comes in seems to be better than the spagnum moss. Any comments on this would be appreciated. Thank you. Winterwhite

[mayres]

I've seen a lot of mixed media's used for phals - bark and sphag, peat and sphag, etc. Just about anything is "fair game". You just need to find a mix or single media that works for your environment and then stick with it - possibly experiment with other concepts and see if you can improve. Use the bamboo skewer concept to verify the moisture deep down in the pot(s) as well as the change in weight. After awhile you can pretty much guess the moisture level by weight alone. I'm not a moss fan myself buy some people swear by it - sphag - NOT green moss. I'm sure many more comments will follow........good luck! mike

[janet_a]

oops, most of my 'chids are in trouble then i guess. i've got some of them in mixed media; so far so good. (the jewel orchid is in soil, bark, sphag, and peat. blooming on 5 spikes at the moment.) i had everybody in sphag but then got a rot scare and moved most of them into a mix of sphag and bark. i have the ortho book, but haven't gotten to the "don't mix the media" part yet. what's their reasoning?

as for green moss, if you're referring to spanish moss, i think the problem is a strong possibility of cooties in it.

[jerrymeola]

The supply wholesalers charge me 50% extra for mixes rather than buying each separate.

Phals can take just about anything except the Phalaenopsis mix they sell at Home Depot and Wal Mart. I do not think they like large bark. (but there is someone who likes it I am sure).

Cattleya I like in a medium bark with pumice, vermiculite, charcoal and sometimes perlite.

Dens I like a smaller bark but generally the same mix.

I pot a lot in hydroponic rocks and often mix some sphag into the mix.

Everything can work if you try to understand how the plant is reacting to the conditions. Some you need to water more often some less.

[Maddy]

I mix sphag and the bark mix and my phals seem to love it. The sphag keeps the bark from drying out too quickly, but the coarse bark keeps air circulating around the roots. (At least, that's what I think.) It takes about a week for the mix to dry out enough to need watering.

I also mixed a small handful of pure peat moss in with the bark for a couple of small catts that seemed to be drying out far too quickly. (I couldn't find sphag at the time, so I had to go for the ground-up version.) They seem to love it - lots of new growth and no more wrinkly pseudobulbs. I also have one of my jewel orchids potted in a half peat, half pearlite mix and it's thriving The other one is in a half and half mix of orchid bark and African violet mix, and is also quite happy.

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

Any 'mix' is probably fine just so long as it is uniformly mixed. This idea of randomly layering it is a very bad idea with the exception of something very open and dry at the bottom. A uniform mix can be tested with a skewer or a finger carefully probing the mix. But a layered mix is impossible to know what is happening in each layer, and they are not likely to have the same moisture content in each, one will be sopping and the other too dry.

Don't use vermiculite in anything orchid related. I have had very bad experience with the current production of vermiculite. Perlite is fine as an ingredient in any of its sizes.