I killed them :(

[Riona]

I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I mounted all of my orchids earlier this year and now most of my phals are getting crown rot. I've been soaking them every other day, misting them every other day in the morning before I leave for work so they're dry when I get home, but I've lost almost all of my phals now. They've only got a little big of sphagnum on them and it dries out to the point of being crispy again in less than the 48 hours between soaking, and my ambient humidity is around 60%. Can anyone figure out what I'm doing wrong? I don't want to get more next year and have them all die on me too

[FLBob]

Well I don't know what you are doing wrong, but I normally don't think of crispy when I think of well grown phals.
You are in Co and have humidity around 60%?

If you are mounting, are you mounting with the crown down or up?

I'm surprised that you have crown rot. Did the crown die while the rest of the plant looked ok? or did all the leafs drop?

[Riona]

I have a fish tank and my other plants are s/h so I get a good bit of evaporation in the air. I'd mounted them with the crown up. Is that the problem? I'm thinking it is crown rot anyway, a couple turned yellow and dropped leaves first, but the last couple that have gone gave no indication that there was anything wrong but just fell apart as I was moving them to water them. Kinda looked like someone put a ring of decay between the leaves and the stem, not crispy, not squishy, just dead in that spot and they have fallen off from there.

[mayres]

Mounted phals should normally be setup with the crowns pointed DOWN as they are in nature - to keep water from accumulating and remaining in the crown area. IF you are soaking them in a common container there is always the possibility that you are transferring organisms responsible for crown rot from one plant to the other.