wrinkled leaves

[Mercedes]

hi all,

I have a few plants that have started to develop wrinkled leaves. Two are Cattleyas, one a new plant that hasn't bloomed yet, but has recent new growth, one and older plant that bloomed a couple months back and has shown no signs of new growth since.

I use the skewer method to test for when to water, I let them get to almost completely dry before watering, and they lived until recently on a southwestern facing windowsill. I was worried, so I moved them to the table a few feet in from the window a couple days ago.

The other plant is a doritaenopsis that was once the glory in my avatar, but started to wilt and look sick, so I trimmed her flower stalks and repotted. I had found a lump of sphag and a bunch of rotted roots. That was a couple of months ago.

I didn't post pics, but I have a couple of phals with wilty, wrinkled leaves, but they are putting out new growth. I'm also going to post about them in a separate post, about a different problem.

What does all of this mean?

Here are some pics:

[jbigio]

Hi in some cases when you have leaves that are wrinkled as yours are there are watering issues. Both over and under watering will cause this condition. Check the roots of each plant first. If the roots are firm and strong then you may not be watering enough. On the other hand if the roots soft and rotted you are watering too much. In that case trim the bad roots re pot in fresh well draining mix and keep them out of bright light for a week or two. if the roots are good and you are sure you are not over watering perhaps it could be viral but the others in the forum will be able to tell you more about that then I. Good luck
Joe

[Mercedes]

I've had problems with rotted roots in the past on phals, and the Dorit. in the above photo. I just peeked at the cattleyas' roots, both seemed papery and dry, but not rotted. The newer catt had root growth, too, so I'm thinking I was underwatering both of those. The doritaenopsis I'm still not sure.

[11Orchid126]

If the roots are dry, then that indicates underwatering. (Wet and mushy means overwatering). In the middle picture, the plant looks overpotted. One of the problems of overpotting is that too much medium for the plant can stay wet because there aren't enough roots to use the moisture. And since the plant is overpotted but the roots are not wet but dry, it's grossly underwatered. When you water, make sure you give the plant enough at one time. Hold it under the fawcet for a good full minute. Then for the cattleya, don't water again until the medium is dry. Phals like to almost dry out.

If the medium is bark, the bark can get bone dry and a light watering will not allow the moisture to reach the core of the bark. The outisde of the bark will dry out too quickly.

[Mercedes]

Those are just decorative pots that you're seeing. The catts are both in plastic pots that are about 3-4" wide, inside of decorative ceramic pots.

The younger catt is in some mix that looks like charcoal (maybe lava rock, but it's dark gray), bark and perlite, with styrofoam at the bottom for drainage (it's original mix from the garden center), the older catt is in bark, perlite, and what looks like chopped sphag, also what it came in from the garden center. Both looked rootbound, but I think catts like smaller pots?

[mayres]

Unlike the rotted roots that you have come to recognize in your phals, dry and papery roots on your catts means dead roots. You can just remove them if there is no substance to them. They should be firm and solid. This would also explain why your leaves are wrinkling - they are not getting any water. Hopefully you will get some new root formation from your newest growths soon.

[Mercedes]

Originally Posted by mayres

Unlike the rotted roots that you have come to recognize in your phals, dry and papery roots on your catts means dead roots. You can just remove them if there is no substance to them. They should be firm and solid. This would also explain why your leaves are wrinkling - they are not getting any water. Hopefully you will get some new root formation from your newest growths soon.

A-ha! So repotting would be safe to do for both catts, after trimming the dead roots? If so, do I need to look for different potting material (all I have on hand is medium and course fir bark)? Would it be totally inappropriate to mix some new bark in with the old charcoal?

[Tobi]

Mercedes,
The medium bark will do just fine. As far as the charcoal, I not sure how fast
it decomposes. I would just go to a garden center or Home Depot or Lowes and
pick up a small bag and use that along with some perlite. That should work for
the repotting. Bring them back gradually to bright filtered light and give them
good air circulation to establish a good root system. Good luck!!

[Mercedes]

Thanks! I'll make a trip out to the garden center and then re-pot.

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

Not signs of virus. Dry, wet, and mushy are terms that should not be used to describe living and dead roots. They will be firm if alive and will collapse is dead. They will be soft if recently dead. I think the pot in pic 2 looks OK in size for a tall Catt in bark. I think you have probably been around enough Mercedes to know to thoroughly soak the mix when you water. But you do have to remember that Catts like it dryer by watering time than Phals & Oncidiums. I would say that if that Catt has good roots, you would need to think in terms of something more exotic for a cause. Shriveling of pseudobulbs is normal.

[robb]

just my observations, but when i first was watering my rescued phals, i simply poured some water through the pots, and collected the run off. thinking this was "enough" watering every few days, i wondered and puzzled at my wilting, wrinkling leaves. on a whim, i mixed up some bowls of water and fertilizer, and just dropped each pot into the bowls, and let it soak about 10-20 minutes, drained and replaced pots on table. the leaves have filled out, stand erect, and are showing even more growth.

lesson learned: it's not the frequency, it's the quality!

[Mercedes]

Tobi, Mayres, Robb, Cynthia, thanks for the advice.

OK, so here's an update on the Catts. I soaked both plants for several minutes to get the roots flexible, then unpotted them. The older catt had several dead roots that needed to be trimmed away, but I would say it lost no more than 25% total. It seemed excessively rootbound, even for a plant that likes a tight-fitting pot, and a lot of the medium was decomposed and crumbling. I repotted with a bark/charcoal/perlite mix that had been soaked, in a terra cotta orchid pot, the kind with slits in the sides. I had to really twirl the roots around the pot to get it to fit, so I think it's a good tight fit.

The younger catt was in worse shape, root-wise. It only had viable roots growing from the recent new growth, everything else was dead. I'd say it had maybe 25% of it's roots left intact after trimming. I repotted it the same way as the older catt, with the old growth nearest the rim of the pot, to leave room for new growth (I may be overly optimistic on that).

That was Monday evening. I checked their skewers today, and the young catt is still slightly damp, the older one seems almost totally dry. I'm going to water the older catt in a bit. Or am I supposed to wait until the skewer is bone dry? Does all this sound about right? Should I be doing anything else?

After reading Sandra's post about her damaged orchids, I'm waiting at least one more day before I water the older catt. I'm now under the impression that when the culture notes say to let it get dry between waterings, they mean dry for a couple of days, at least. Can someone add some advice on that?

[robb]

i can't comment regarding catts, but my phals certainly seem to be just fine if i let them get right to dry before watering. remember, in the wild, rain doesn't come every 8 days or whatever your schedule is

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

I think the skewer drys before the mix, so waiting a bit is probably a good idea. But remember, the dryer you get it, the harder it is to re-wet, so you need to soak it really well when you water, especially when the mix is new. You will find that aged mix soaks up the water pretty fast by comparison.

[Olive]

I too have a question about wrinkled leaves, but on my Phals.

I have two that have been in different spots in my kitchen that have wrinkling leaves. One is an older Phal that has a few leaves wrinkling (which hopefully is just its normal process of shedding some leaves??) This phal has never re-bloomed since I got it, so I would also love to know how to get it to bloom again.

The second Phal I got this past summer and it has sprouted a keiki from the flower spike (I seem to be able to grow keikis but not flowers!). In the past few months however, all of the leaves on this plant have been wrinkling. The keiki keeps growing bigger so I thought the plant was okay, but I am concerned about the wrinkling and cannot see any healthy roots. It was quite moist (sitting in water) when I brought it home from the store but I tend to wait for it to dry out before re-watering (i.e., no water in the bowl of stones under them) so I don't think that I over watered it. Therefore, I'm not sure if I should repot (given that it is the winter here in Toronto Canada where I live) or maybe try soaking thoroughly as someone else suggested above?

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

[Nancy]

Another thing I think might help is monitor very closely your humidity. I have a Cattleya aclandiae that lets me know every time my humidity is low because it wrinkles its older leaves. i think increasing your humidity will offer the plants another way to get needed water and to grow healthy new leaves.

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

Olive, a picture would be very helpful. The first picture of Mercedes problem plants actually looks like it could be fusarium wilt, but only because one can see in the picture that the shriveling is running perpendicular to the length of the leaf.

You really have to find out what the inside of the pot is doing for moisture, hence the skewer method for finding out. Just guessing because of some external measure is not enough. If nothing else, dig a finger into the pot, but be very careful to avoid stabbing a root with a finger nail, then feel the mix down inside. You may want to dig the whole with a disposable glove on then take it off to feel the condition of the mix. I should be dry or just barely cool to the touch, but nothing should come out stuck to your finger indicating wetness.

[Nancy]

One thing that helps me to stop overwatering is to place crock at the bottom of the pots. I also wait a few days before watering a newly potted plant in order to give the roots time to recover from the shock of being trimmed. Increase the humidity and keep the newly potted plant sort of shaded until you see new root growth. I'm sorry if I've said what other people have already said. I just know how upsetting it is to have wrinkled leaves. Good luck with your plants. You're in good hands with all the wisdom the growers have on this website.