Tough plant stories

[Ellen]

Janet's post made me think it would be interesting to hear everybody's story about the worst thing one of their orchids survived. Here's mine:

It happened to a small seedling size (Lc Edgard van Belle x C intermedia) x Blc Magic Meadows 'Green Genius' - I know, the name is bigger than the plant. It was the middle of winter, which is mostly cloudy in Seattle. The plant was for some reason sitting in a highly exposed place, and a full day of unexpected sun fried one of the leaves. The well-meaning person who was taking care of the orchids saw the blackened leaf and panicked, thinking it was some horrible contagious disease, cut the leaf off, and put what little was left of the plant outside to isolate it from the other plants. After being severely sunburned, the plant survived several nights of sub-freezing temperatures and when I finally rescued it it had a coating of ice on it. The Hollywood ending to the story is that the plant lived happily ever after and now has lots of new growth. I guess the moral of the story is that Catts can take an amazing amount of abuse, so you shouldn't stay awake nights worrying about them.

[jerrymeola]

I bring a lot of small plug size orchids to the farmer's markets and they have a tendency to fall out of the pots.

One Lc. Angel's Treasure fell out several times. The last time it was in a hot truck for a week and fell on the ground when setting up. After stepping on it 3-4 times over the day, it was found on packing. There was nothing left of the leaves other than a little green in between breaks in the leaves. This on a 3 inch high plant with 1 inch of roots.

I did not have the heart to throw it away and happen to find it in the shade house today growing nicely and filling a 4 inch pot in only 6 months from semi-destroying it.

It may even bloom this summer but certainly by next year at the rate of growth.

a dend. nobile noid survived and outlived the scale it had when i threw it out in late winter. i think i see a few buds forming. go figure. i still keep it isolated scale sux.

[janet_a]

-giggle- from what i read elsewhere, the best way to get a failing orchid to thrive is to throw it on the compost pile. (in certain cliamtes of course.) several people have tossed the plant out and gone out several months later to find the thing not only growing but blooming on the pile.