Need opinion on plants/potting please...

[newbud]

....I'm really feeling like a crack addict or something. I went and spent my last few dollars before payday to buy some more plants. I'm up to 10 now in less that a week. I bought 3 today that were bloomed out and 50% off. Couldn't turn that down. So now I'm buying plants I don't even have a clue what they look like except for some possible looks on Google. Anyhow, my wife thinks I should replant because they are in sphagnum and she saw a bunch of movies on YouTube saying to get 'em in bark as soon as possible. They are Wilsonara Tigersette 'Wild Court' AM/AOS. A wils. Piquant 'Luscious' and a Beallara Diana Dunn 'Pisgah'. The Beallara was really dried out and packed tight in moss. So I did the best I could unpacking it and re-potting in bark. My question is was my wife correct in saying get rid of the moss and get it in bark? You can see in my pics what it looked like.

[orchidlover55]

The moss was ok Jack if it wasn't too old I have several of mine in Moss but Bark is good too it did look very dry. I was wondering did you soak your bark real good before potting your orchid in it ? Seeing that the orchid needed water so bad it would have been better if you soaked your bark for at least overnight before planting your orchid in it . You did a great job though it looks healthy, just a little thirsty

[Hummer344]

I don't like moss but that is my personal opinion. If you plant in moss it should be loosly packed. Not like a brick. In either case, take out as much as you can of the old moss, cut off rotted & dead roots and put it in the medium of your choice. I aggree with OL55 that you should soak bark type medium for 24 hours before using it. If you want to check the moisture of your plants you can use the skewer method. Get some bamboo skewers, the thicker ones, not the real thin ones, & stick one in each plant. Pull them out periodically and check for wetness. If the skewer is wet, don't water. I water my plants when the skewer is still moist but not wet.
Good Luck

[koshki]

Jack, the two plants you have purchased are both water hogs...and I have always had a hard time keeping water hogs hydrated properly, especially in standard bark mixes.

My solution is to skip most oncidium types (yours are from the oncidium alliance). I only have three Twinkles left in my collection, and I have changed the type of medium they're in a few times, trying to find the right thing for me and my plants.

Currently, I've got all three in seedling grade Orchiata bark, in net pots. I water them heavily a couple times a week, and they seem to be doing the best so far. Plump p'bulbs, no pleated leaves. All three bloomed fairly well this last season.

After getting rid of sphag in everything I grew (when I first started with orchids), I have gradually gone back to it for certain types of plants. It took some time for me to get a handle this subject.

It's a formula kind of like this:

The Plant's Needs + My Growing Conditions + My Plant Care Habits = Best Medium for the Plant

If any one of those elements is "problematic", I have learned to recognize that the plant just can't live with me! It also means that what would work for another person might not work as well for you.

[newbud]

Thanks Koshki for sharing your experience with these plants. I've been trying for a half hour to upload some pictures to ask questions about and it blows up, so I wanted to ask about the wrinkling on the pods of these plants. I don't know if you can see it in these pictures or not but I will upload better ones when I can. Ha...Well I found out you don't upload 8 at one time. If you do groups of 2 and 3 you can get 'er done. So now that you can see the wrinkled pods what do you think. Normal or too dry? Also, my Pot. bloom is upside down with respect to the rest of the plant. I haven't seen the lips on top before. Is this normal?

[koshki]

In my experience, once the bulbs get wrinkled, they never completely smooth out, although they can plump back up a bit. This process takes days, maybe even weeks. The best solution to wrinkled p'bulbs is prevention...sufficient watering. The tricky part is that the also need adequate air circulation at the roots.

Your plant has already bloomed, so these bulbs will only serve as a resource for the new growth, which I'm betting will begin to show up in the next few weeks. Keep the new growths properly hydrated, and you will see blooms in the next cycle.

I don't think it would hurt your plants if you left a bit of water in the cache pot for the plant to absorb over time. These guys really are thirsty devils!

[Carkin]

When you repotted your Oncidium types, did you find a good amount of healthy roots? If so, then to help plump up the shrivelled pseudobulbs you can put the pot in a bowl of water and soak the roots for a few hours then take it out and let the water drain completely out. You won't notice a difference right away but in a couple days you will see that the pseudobulbs will start to fill out again, although not completely (they will keep a few wrinkles). It is important that the new growth gets enough water otherwise the leaves will grow with accordian-like pleats.

Oh, and I meant to add...your Dens are beautiful!!!

[FLBob]

Jack just a couple of things -

First I agree with Katherine, your new plants require constant moisture and would probably do best in sphag. Notice the thin leaves and fine roots of your new plants, good indicators of the cultural requirements. While you can keep a bark mix moist, the bark will break down very quickly if kept constantly wet. Moss on the other hand can remain moist, and with a low PH it's not conducive to bacteria growth. The one downside to growing thin root plants in sphag is that it is nearly impossible to remove the old moss when repotting, something you probably just discovered

Second your photo of Pot Little Furturne is probably labeled incorrectly. A Pot. is in the cattleya alliance while the flower in your photo is most likely a dendrobium. But to your question about the flower being upside down. I don't believe that is the natural state for this plant and probably occurred as a result of the plant being moved while the buds were being formed.

[newbud]

Thanks you guys. Great comments. Yeah, when I repotted the first one I could not separate the roots from the moss without tearing out some roots with it. See first pics. So I'm nervous about repotting the second one in moss. The one in bark you guys think I should repot in moss?
Also, I got the Potinara from Pikes nursery in Atlanta and they are a big outfit but I'm not sure they cultivate their own orchids. The plant came with that tag: Pot. Little Fortune. Go figure. It's hard to really trust the tag from Anywhere unless you know the grower and they're competent. I've never seen a flower upside down before. Maybe I have an anomaly.

[Carkin]

Originally Posted by newbud

Thanks you guys. Great comments. Yeah, when I repotted the first one I could not separate the roots from the moss without tearing out some roots with it. See first pics. So I'm nervous about repotting the second one in moss. The one in bark you guys think I should repot in moss?
Also, I got the Potinara from Pikes nursery in Atlanta and they are a big outfit but I'm not sure they cultivate their own orchids. The plant came with that tag: Pot. Little Fortune. Go figure. It's hard to really trust the tag from Anywhere unless you know the grower and they're competent. I've never seen a flower upside down before. Maybe I have an anomaly.

My first Cattleya bloom opened upsidedown and the second one right side up! I bought it in bud so I was told that it got a little confused with the relocation to my home, so don't worry it definately happens to others!

I too have had to experiment with different potting mediums for my Oncidium types. For me the combination that has worked the best is sphagnum moss on the top half of the pot and a small grade bark mix on the bottom but everyone has different growing conditions and watering habits. I am surprised how tough and resiliant they are if you are patient with them, so don't give up!

[koshki]

I'm not familiar with Potinara, but my first thought was that your photo was of a dendrobium.

Trust me, it won't be the last time you get a mis-labeled plant! Fellow Geek Or-Kid and I have both purchased mis-labeled plants from a local vendor. At least mine really was a phal, but she wanted to buy a paph and got a phrag instead! He kept insisting it was a paph even though she knew it wasn't.

Some orchid vendors are a little bit what you might call "colorful"...

[orchidlover55]

Like FlBob was saying , I had to put some of my orchids in Sphagnum Moss AAA or 5star because of the heat we had last summer here in the south , and it's a good way to get a Phal orchid that's not doing too well to come right back to life for me . I had a Phal that had one root so small that I just knew it wasn't going to make it but then I placed it in sphagnum moss and it went crazy I have to order it online though because you can't get the good kind around here .

[Micky]

Originally Posted by koshki

In my experience, once the bulbs get wrinkled, they never completely smooth out, although they can plump back up a bit. This process takes days, maybe even weeks. The best solution to wrinkled p'bulbs is prevention...sufficient watering. The tricky part is that the also need adequate air circulation at the roots.

Your plant has already bloomed, so these bulbs will only serve as a resource for the new growth, which I'm betting will begin to show up in the next few weeks. Keep the new growths properly hydrated, and you will see blooms in the next cycle.

I don't think it would hurt your plants if you left a bit of water in the cache pot for the plant to absorb over time. These guys really are thirsty devils!

When you say thirsty, how often should they be watered then?? Should they be kept moist?