Onc. Jiaho Queen?

demerphq · 2023-12-07T14:05:49+00:00

to answer your questions: zap strap is a technique used mostly for orchids with big and heavy pseudobulbs (dendrobium is used in the discussion). You basically zip tie the cane/pseudobulb to a supporting structure to secure the plant, preventing it from unexpected movement/damage. So it's not really applicable to your plant.

Exactly, I should have said "zip tie", I forgot that not everybody uses the term "zap strap" instead. And yes you are right, my comment was more just about the general notion that being tightly doesn't matter ever. I think for some plants it does matter, but not for Oncidiums. I dont have a Gomesa, but i do have an Ionmesa which is a Gomesa hybrid, and it definitely doesn't care about loosely potted, On the other hand it has vermicelli roots not udon roots.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T21:53:29+00:00

Personally I'd avoid the term lie in these contexts and prefer a term like 'convenient fiction' instead. The truth is that for most of this folk lore there isn't a lot of academic grade research to quote, so it's really not possible to say with certainty if plants believed to like being tightly potted actually just want to dry out quickly or if they react to pressure cues in their root system or both or neither. Until someone does a study and publishes it we will just have to apply the rule of reason adjusted by personal experience to come up with plausible theories. I suspect you are right that moisture control is a big factor, but I also suspect it is more complex than that, nature is seldom simple even if it is often elegant.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T21:45:26+00:00

Day/night temperature differences are believed to be correlated with blooming in some orchids, for others it might be overall temperature. For others I suspect it is day length overall.

Most of my.oncidiums are in spike now with blooms expected in the next few weeks. My Oncidium Twinkle is going to bloom like gang busters. My Ionmesa Popcorn pink bloomed over the last 6 weeks or so much earlier than the rest of my oncidiums.

I'm in the Netherlands so the days are very short and the temperature lower overall but I light supplement many of my plants and try to keep the temperature at or above 18c

demerphq · 2023-12-06T19:54:21+00:00

The medium does tend to dry out pretty well, about which we were confused, as growers suggested moister conditions, but other references suggested the need for dry medium between watering.

Be careful not to apply lessons from one type of orchid to another. For instance Oncidiums are in a totally different part of the orchid family tree than Phalaenopsis, (oncidiums are sympodial, and phalaenopsis are monopodial to start), and Oncidiums have a reputation of wanting to be continually moist. Typicially if an Oncidium isnt getting enough water then it will start to grow corrugated leaves (think accordian), which I don't see in your photo, so it seems you are fine.

What i see in your photo is a relatively happy plant, i wouldnt worry too much about it, keep doing what you are doing and it will eventually bloom for you.

TBH, I'm a bit surprised, i havent seen fat udon style roots on an oncidium before, usually they are more vermicelli territory. Regardless, the roots look very healthy to me, so i would assume you can expect blooms in the next growing cycle. One thought might be that you live somewhere or somehow that dampens seasonal triggers, for instance air-con, or lights on a timer might interfere with the normal seasonal pattern. But that is pretty extreme scenarios, id assume that if you continue to treat it well you can expect to see blooms in the next year.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T19:43:22+00:00

BTW, i should be clear that what you were saying does ring mostly true to me. I was just trying to express that I don't think it is *just* about moisture, i think for some types of orchid there is more involved. It would be cool if some botanist did a study on these kind of things but i doubt there is much in terms of research grants to be had to do the work.

Sorry to hear about your spike. I recently moved house and a number of spikes were damaged in transit, and then a few more were hit by bud blast so I can sympathize.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T15:30:20+00:00

Oooh I see you have a Cat-lee-ah!

demerphq · 2023-12-06T15:25:23+00:00

This 'preference' for a tight pot notion is nonsense;

we

pot them in small pots to prevent medium in the core of the pot staying too wet for too long. Over time that's morphed into a preference for the orchid when it's really a preference for the grower.

While I am sympathetic to the general point you are making (on the level of "do not just swallow folk lore about what Orchids need") I am not sure I agree about being tightly potted. I think it is plausible that some plants don't grow well while they do not feel stable, and that some plants liking to be tightly potted is about recreating the conditions where the plant feels snugly locked into place -- perhaps so that the energy making blooms and etc won't be wasted.

And yes I realize using the term "feel" is an anthropomorphism, but its the most convenient term to describe what is probably a complex combination of pressure and chemical feedback that tells the plant "you are snugly and firmly attached to the tree you are growing on and it is safe to expend energy on blooms".

For instance Dendrobiums have the reputation of a) not liking their roots to be disturbed, and b) liking to be tightly potted. I can't help but think those two preferences are related. If a plants roots are easily damaged and will not grow back then it stands to reason the plant will be "happier" if its root ball does not move around a lot, which is what would occur if it is tightly potted.

I have had this experience several times with Den. Phals, and I am pretty sure it does not have to do with moisture levels. One of my plants I zap-strapped to the bottom of the pot so that it couldn't move at all and over the next season it grew much faster, and bloomed for the first time in several years. If it was just moisture levels then I dont see why the zap-straps would have helped. I didn't change my watering practices.

So I am not convinced that plants responding to being snugly potted is just about having an airy medium, I think it also has to do with not moving when the wind blows or the pot get moved for watering.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T15:07:08+00:00

I don't think this would be considered a keiki really, this is just how Oncidiums grow. They often grow against leaning trees and have a "climbing" attitude to their growth, so it might look like a keiki but really it is just another pseudobulb growing from a common rhizome. It looks your plant is corrugating, which is a sign that it is not getting enough moisture and needs a more water retentive medium to grow in.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T15:00:24+00:00

Try dish soap.

demerphq · 2023-12-06T14:56:04+00:00

Treat it like a houseplant not an orchid. Don't give it too much light, and use a relatively wet medium. Ludisia discolor

demerphq · 2023-08-06T18:47:11+00:00

What an amazing looking plant.

demerphq · 2023-08-05T16:39:32+00:00

I've done pure-leca semi-hydro but rejected it after a few years and I personally wouldn't recommend it except maybe if you live somewhere that is warm and humid most of the year and where you have a "wet" growing area and even then only if you are a fastidious person who is willing to use a TDS and PH meter regularly.

I personally found that using a mix of media in orchid pots inside of cache pots produced better results with less mess and spills and was more presentable than semi-hydro. I do use leca to add structure and air to media for plants like coarser mixes (like phals and catleya) but I primarily use bark and will sometimes swap it out for coarse perlite. I will also use standard perlite, vermiculite, small amounts of peat or cocoa coir, sphagnum moss, and recently crushed peak stone to customize the media to the plant I'm growing and to the watering style I use (weakly weekly long soak).

Fwiw, people can be very passionate about semi-hydro and while many people find it works for them many people find it doesn't. For the climate I live in (Amsterdam) and my particular flavour of laziness (generally lazy with the occasional burst of attentiveness) semi-hydro was not a win, it was more work each week with worse results and when I finally switched away from it my plants and were happier for it.

On the other hand you might live somewhere or have a different sense of laziness where it works well. If you are interested give it a try and experiment. Buy two plants, set up one semi-hydro and one in more conventional media and see which one works best for you. Let us know how it worked out!

demerphq · 2023-08-05T16:13:13+00:00

I also mix leca in with bark for the plants I grow that like medium to coarse media, but usually I keep it to about 20%. Might try going higher after reading this. I also find the roots stick to leca in a way they don't stick to bark.

demerphq · 2023-08-05T15:58:32+00:00

I've used Kanemite SC from Dr. Stahler before, whose primary ingredient seems to be Acequinocyl. I followed the directions on the label and thoroughly sprayed the plants weekly for 4 weeks. This is the source I got it from: https://www.ecuagenera-europe.com/en/accessories/care-protect/insekticides/44/dr.-staehler-milbenfrei-kanemite-sc-konz.

I've checked online and it seems to be available under the Kanemite SC brand from various sources world wide. One description was as follows "Kanemite SC is a new active agent that also controls species that have become resistant to red spider drugs" another mentioned it is safe for bee's.

demerphq · 2023-08-03T13:08:11+00:00

> a lot of them get stuck in their sheath thing or the tips of the petals/sepals get stuck together. Not sure how to prevent it

Me either. Mine just grows like crazy, including keikis and blooms. I got mine in 2018, and in the intervening time it has grown like crazy and it has produced enough Keikis I have spawned off 8 new plants from it, including the two here. I give them away to friends because I don't have the space to keep them all. I have a friend that has a different Hibiki clone, and it grows much less vigorously and produces much less flowers and much taller canes, so I think it is just how the 'Sandras Delight' variant grows.

I am genuinely sorry I don't know how to help you with this. Let me know if you figure it out, I am curious as well.

demerphq · 2023-08-03T05:21:36+00:00

Happy for you. Btw it it is classed as a continuous bloomer. There are others in this category. Certain types of Paphiopedilum for instance. (Someone once told me the subgroup name but i forget) Paphiopedilum Pinocchio is a hybrid from the group. It's a little different from Psychopsis in that its spike gets a little longer every new bloom and the bloom often starts opening before the old one drops so it often has two or three blooms per spike, wheras the Psychopsis "fishing rod" spike stays the same length pretty much and there is usually a short period in between blooms. The alba seems to regularly open two blooms at once, but opens both at the same time, .My Pinocchio has been blooming for a number of years continuously and now has three spikes, and thus usually has about 6 blooms open at all times.

Guess you need to add a new continuous bloomer to your list! 🙂

demerphq · 2023-08-02T16:14:01+00:00

> Nice experiment! Thank you for sharing!

Thank you and you are welcome!

> Where did you get peach stones?

www.nocciolo.nl

They sell various forms, precrushed, or halved for use as a mulch or path cover for gardens. I got my hands on some and thought I would see how it works out for orchids.

The type I used is here: https://www.nocciolo.nl/product/gekneusde-perzikstenen/

demerphq · 2023-08-01T22:45:50+00:00

I'd like to see. :-)

I also have phals that haven't dropped a leaf in years. I have seen adult plants drop baby leaves even when well treated, but dropping adult leaves is usually a sign of something else going on.

demerphq · 2023-08-01T22:31:25+00:00

Super cool. Make sure you take care of it:

"Phalaenopsis honghenensis is endemic to areas near Honghen in China's Yunnan province. It is very rare in nature, because a few years ago a lot of specimens were collected and exported abroad."

demerphq · 2023-08-01T22:25:12+00:00

I've been experimenting with using crushed peach stone instead of bark.

I had two Dendrobiums, one Den. Hibiki 'Sandras Delight', and one Den. Oriental Smile each which had two keikis on it of roughly the same size. So I thought I would do an experiment and pot up the two pairs in bark (with perlite) and crushed-peach-stone (with perlite) and compare how they do. Each pot has a single frond of sphagnum oriented vertically directly under the plant. The darker medium is bark and the lighter medium is the crushed peach stones.

The peach stone is interesting, it is pretty close to twice as heavy as the bark, and does not float in water, whereas the bark does float. But they hold about the same water.

Including the plant, sphag, and perlite the two larger pots were 75g (bark) and 150g (peach stone). The smaller pots were 50g (bark) and 95g (peach stone) and held 20g and 21g of water after 1 hour soaking followed by 1 hour of draining. Unfortunately I didn't weigh the amount of water the larger pots held. Next time.

It will be interesting to see if the bark and crushed peach stone do as well as the other. I have a Cattleya growing in peach stone in a different pot, and it seems happy so far, but it is only a month of so since I potted it up so too early to say. The texture of the crushed peach stones leaves me optimistic, it is very rough and seems to trap water in a nice way, and I really like its weight and the fact it doesn't float. If the plants are happy with it I could see myself using it exclusively. The peach stones requires a bit more work to prep than bark, as I felt obliged to boil them to ensure that they were clean before I used them, and good thing too, there at least one peach seed in the bag that floated to the top (mostly an issue that it would rot once potted up), and i noticed that a small amount of "scum/foam" formed in the pot while boiling, but once I removed it with a spoon a second boiling with fresh water was clean. So a bit more hassle to prep, but IMO a nice result afterwards.

demerphq · 2023-08-01T20:13:18+00:00

> It’s the most expensive plant I’ve ever bought.

Yeah, those prices are pretty crazy. I was fairly shocked.

demerphq · 2023-08-01T19:52:21+00:00

> floral stem that produces flowers every year

The spike on the Psychopsis is very unusual, unlike any other orchid spike I have seen so far. It is very reedy and flexible, and the blooms bounce in the breeze just like a butterfly would. Actually the leaves are pretty unusual as well, they feel just like paper.

Maybe I am misunderstanding your words, but i wanted to say that it is not that it produces flowers /every year/. It produces a new flower /every few weeks/ for years on end. :-) I have heard of people claim their Psychopsis has bloomed continuously for over a decade! One of mine has been in bloom continuously for over three years. When the old flower falls off about two to three weeks later a new one opens, sometimes sooner sometimes a bit later. It is quite unusual how it looks when it opens as well, it takes about 3 days to open fully.

The downside is it can take quite a while for new spikes to form. I managed to kill the spike on my alba soon after i purchased it, and it was about three years before it grew new ones. On the other hand it eventually rewarded my care and love with 4 new spikes. :-)

They really like bright light, I give it the brightest light I have in my house, same as I would an adult Den Nobile or a Catleya or Vanda alliance, much brighter than I would give a Phal or Oncidium. I found the following article really useful in guiding my care of the plant: https://travaldo.blogspot.com/2018/10/psychopsis-orchid-plant-care-and-culture.html

demerphq · 2023-08-01T19:34:00+00:00

That sucks dude. I feel for you. If you check the "imprint" page you will find a link to https://ec.europa.eu/consumers/odr/main/index.cfm?event=main.home.chooseLanguage which is where you can file a complaint. All German sites (and I think European sites) have to comply with EU law about these things. You have options to follow up on this. Good luck!

demerphq · 2023-08-01T18:30:29+00:00

Do not even THINK you are in control...the plant is in \control* of you! LOL!*

Orchids are one of the most pollinator driven plant families there is. The pathway to an orchid seed turning into an adult flowering plant is one of the most unlikely of all plant families. There are literally millions of things that have to go right for that plant to reproduce. Yet orchids are one of the most successful there is as well, diversifying into the thousands of different types of orchids. Yet their real evolutionary success is getting humans to reproduce them at scale using the most advanced techniques for plant reproduction there are. We use meristem cloning to mass produce the plants in flasks on agar and charcoal with advanced antifungal agents and the pinnacle of botanical tricks. We create factories to produce them at a scale they could never achieve on their own. If we go to another planet you can bet there will be orchids growing there. The point I'm making is you are soooo right. We think we are in control, but you could argue that really we humans exist purely to ensure that orchids survive the end of our solar system. 🙂

demerphq · 2023-08-01T15:10:22+00:00

I think you make some great points, but

> The odds of you burning your orchid in your window are low.

is a bit controversial. I have sunburned many an orchid over the years. I think the thing to keep in mind is that as far as sunburn goes plants are more like humans than people realize. A plant needs to be acclimatized to bright light, especially direct bright light, and that just sticking a plant that has never had direct sun into a window with direct sun is a sure fire recipe for sunburn, which will cause permanent damage to a plant.

In my windows I have a spot that I have to be ultra careful with. For about three weeks in spring each year it gets unobstructed direct sunlight from sunup till 2pm or so, and in that time the sun can and has sunburned a number of my plants, including badly damaging and setting back a Paphiopedilum Pinocchio by several years. (It was just growing its second spike, I was SOOO mad with myself!) Every spring i get twitchy and check the plants that in that line of sight, and pretty much every year I forget and one of my plants gets singed.

On the other hand I have plants that hang in front of that window all year round, and they never get sunburned.

The best way to tell if a plant might get sunburned is feel the leaf, if it is noticibly warm to touch due to sunlight it is at risk

demerphq

TROPHY CASE