Phragmipedium bessae hybrid

We went to a repotting demonstration in our earliest orchid days at a nursery. The "Orchid Goddess" there Cynthia made a division of the Phrag and decided to give it to us because we were nice people. We were so excited about it. Steven especially, because phrags are one of his favorite types.

It's a bessae hybrid, probably Dom Wimber and Longifolium but we aren't really sure. It has long sepals and is a peachy pinkish color. We have had all sorts of trouble with this one, mostly from not following the initial instructions Cynthia gave us. She told us it wants lots of light and to keep it wet in a tray of water. We planted it in a 6 inch plastic pot in fir bark medium and for a while we did keep it in a tray of water. But then we got freaked out that we were rotting the roots and stopped doing that. Then we started fertilizing more regularly, and it seemed to be causing the leaf tips to turn brown and eventually take over the whole leaf. I think that was because we were using the fertilizer water in the water tray instead of clean water. Then we quit fertilizing but for occassionally, so of course it more or less quit growing. Somewhere in there was an aborted flowering attempt. It made a spike and bud, but then the bud turned brown like the leaf ends and died. That was one of our biggest orchid disappointments yet. We had done some research online and it said if the ends were browning it was a salts accumulation problem, but for us it was really an underwatering problem. The bessae hybrids want to be WET!

We eventually got it together and adjusted the potting so that there's about an inch of styrofoam in the bottom where it sits in water so the bark doesn't rot too fast. We put nutricote on it instead of using the liquid fertilizer that we use on everyone else. I water it once or twice a week in the sink with all the other babies and that activates the fertilizer. I keep it's tray filled with fresh clean water all the time. I had to put the plastic pot inside a clay pot because the dark plastic was getting really hot in the sun and I was worried about overheating the roots. It gets a lot of light. It lives with the couple of vandaceous orchids we have. It is finally thriving!!! It is growing where it was sort of halted before, and no more leaf browning! I'm really hopeful for a flower this year.

That whole process took about 2 years of figuring it out.