Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Mini Cattleyas: Cattleya lueddemanniana v. coerulea and Cattleya petite doll

These came from the Redland Orchid Festival in May 2013. We got them because we like miniatures, the pictures of their flowers were really cute, and they were a good price. They were basically bare root tucked into little plastic pots and taped into the pots so they didn't fall out. When we got them home we had to make a huge assessment about what plants we would put in what available pots because we had bought so many at the show. We decided to put these into little 4" wooden orchid baskets that we had sitting at home unused. It's hard to find something small enough for that size basket. But these miniatures will be just the thing we hope. We tucked them in with our standard bark mix. We didn't use Styrofoam for these because the baskets are so small they should dry out fast enough. One of them is doing better than the other.

Cattleya lueddmanniana got tipped over in our initial move to Chicago, and has been a bit slow to recover. It hasn't put on any new growths or roots. The existing plant doesn't seem to be declining, but it's not thriving either. Hopefully it will start putting on new growth and get going.


Cattleya petite doll on the other hand seems to be doing really well. It didn't have any moving mishaps, so it has been putting on new growths.

 
We are growing them in good light like all the cattleyas, letting them dry out completely between waterings, and fertilizing every time we water while they are in active growth with Dyna Gro- Grow.
 
I have no idea how big these need to be in order to flower. I'm assuming it will be similar to our Cattleya cernua when it's big enough to flower. If they continue to do well, especially petite doll maybe they will flower next year. Another nice thing about miniatures is that you can have lots of plants, and they still don't take up that much space! We have been really excited about trying to grow huge specimen sized miniatures (well all the plants really) but especially the miniatures. We've seen some at shows and they just look so cool huge (well, huge for a miniature).

The Redland Orchid Festival 2013

Being obsessed people, it was clearly critical that we go to the Redland Orchid Festival and buy a bunch of new orchids even though we were moving to Chicago in a week. We decided to go because we hadn't taken proper advantage of the show last year being newer to orchid growing and overwhelmed by the quantity of orchids there. Also, they have a lot of really good deals, and we thought we may not have an opportunity to buy at good prices any time soon. So we went. We went Sunday kind of as a strategy because Fred told us sometimes the vendors that come from overseas are trying to get rid of their stuff for really cheap because they don't want to take it back home with them. We went with a list of things we had been hankering for; things we had seen at other shows that looked really cool etc. We told ourselves we were only getting things from the list, and we did mostly stick to that. I'm including separate posts for all the things we bought there, not to worry! Now that we don't live in Florida anymore, we are still thinking about going to it every year.

Brassia rex x Brassia longisima: the sickies

We got this plant bare root, for what we thought was a good deal, from the local guy who grows tons of orchids and has a sale at his home greenhouses every year. We were really excited about it because a Brassia rex had been on our list of things we would like to have. It was three divisions with some good new growths. We potted them all into the same large clay azalea pot with a lot of Styrofoam in the bottom and our standard bark mix. We watered once per week, and sprayed the top when it started to look dry to encourage any new roots. There had been some spots on the some of the leaves when we got it, but the leaves fairly rapidly turned yellow and fell off. Basically it had a fungus or something and most of the plant died. The pseudobulbs started to rot and get all mushy. This all happened over the course of about a month. We only have a little bit of the plant left. The same thing happened to a friend who had also bought one of these at the same sale. We repotted it into a large rehab chamber- a 6" plastic pot with lots of holes in it filled with Styrofoam peanuts in the bottom and sphagnum moss. There's only two pseudobulbs left of the original 8 or so, and 2 growths to go with them. So far it seems as if these sections might make it, but time will tell. We haven't ever treated for fungus or bacterial infections before, so we didn't know what types of products to use or where to get the right things for orchids. We had never had this kind of disease problem before and were kind of mad that we had been sold bum plants. Oh well, hopefully these pieces that are left will make it because we were really excited about having that plant.

Monday, July 22, 2013

Phalaenopsis gigantea

We got this plant a little bit as a consolation prize, but have since grown to love it. We had really wanted one of those huge Bulbophyllums like Bulbo phalenopsis that make leaves 6ft long. However, they were more than a little out of our price range at $150! Even seedlings are like $50! There was a local man in our area in Florida that specializes in Bulbophyllums, but also grows just about everything. He has a sale at his home once per year. We attended that and saw a larger version of the Phal gigantea and thought it would make a nice giant bulbophyllum substitute. It was also more within our price range at $35. It also has pretty flowers that don't smell like dead rotting things.  It had three nice leaves when we bought it, and it's planted sideways in a shallow 2-3" orchid basket that is 8". It is growing in moss over Styrofoam peanuts for air circulation. We added a little more moss to the top part because that's where most of the roots were and they were looking a little exposed. After their life in a greenhouse, we were worried they would find their new life a bit drier. We keep it moist just like our other Phals, watering when the medium is mostly but not completely dry. We have been fertilizing it along with all the others every time we water. It has made a nice big new leaf for us. It seems to be quite happy. We are also really happy with our purchase.


Miltassia Shelob "Tolkein"

We also got this at the Highlands County Orchid Show in March 2013. We bought it bare root because it seemed cool looking in the pictures they had of it, and it was inexpensive. We looked it up and found out that it should be grown pretty much exactly like an Oncidium. It wants medium light levels between a cattleya and a Phal and to dry out completely between waterings. We potted it in a 6" clay pot with the standard orchid bark mix. We put a little bit of moss at the bases of the new growths to keep any new roots moist until they got further down into the medium. It had two mostly mature new growths when we bought it that hadn't made any roots yet. It started making roots fairly quickly so that was really encouraging. We are always holding our breath whenever we change and repot things to see how they will do. Until it starts showing signs of good success we are nervous. Then a couple of months later, to our amazement, it started putting out two flowering spikes!! We were not expecting that at all, especially since it had just been potted. Once it started making spikes I of course started Bloom boosting it! The spikes survived the moves for the most part. I think we may not have watered it enough when the spikes were growing and forming buds because a few of the buds turned yellow and fell off. Three flowers did form and open though, and they are really cool looking.


Zygopetalum "Jumping Jack"

We got this plant bare root from the Highlands County Orchid Show in March 2013. We picked it out because there was a large specimen sample and it smelled lovely, it had neat different colors and it was spotted. We didn't know much about this type, so we had to look it up online. We learned it wants Oncidium light levels (between a cattleya and a Phal) and it wants to be evenly moist. We at first decided to pot it in a 4" clay pot with our usual bark mix. It became clear pretty quickly though that the bark mix just would not stay wet enough. We switched it into moss in the same clay pot. It seemed to perk up after that. It was in bud when we got it, so it flowered right away. The flower actually lasted surprisingly well considering the repotting trauma. We water it when it gets most of the way dry, often about once per week, but sometimes up to two weeks. We fertilize it every time we water with the Dyna Gro- Grow. It has only just recently started to put on any new growth at all in June. We have been anxiously awaiting it to do this because that's how you know the repotting is going to take and be alright.

The One and Only Catasetum: Cycnodes Golden Shower "King" x Mormodes revoluta "Yellow"

We got this plant from the nursery we popped into on a trip to St. Pete FL along with the Maxillaria tenuifolia because it was so interesting looking. I had never noticed an orchid like this before, and had no idea how to take care of it. We did some research and found out that it is an orchid that needs resting. Tons of water and fertilizer during the growing season and basically completely dry during the winter. The plant makes a lot of sugary sap droplets all over the leaves for some reason. When we got it this years growth was about 6-8" tall and the roots for it were sort of gnarled looking not going the inch down into the medium. The plant has never really looked good. We don't really know what it's problem is. The leaves look a little water stressed, and recently a couple of them started turning yellow. We are also always paranoid that it has bugs or something. I'm not sure if it's problem is that most of the roots for the currently growing part never made it down into the medium so it is struggling. It's in a 4" plastic pot that we purchased it in still potted in sphagnum because it seemed to be fitting in there just fine. The roots from the older growths all look great. We don't really know what to do with it, so we just keep watering it and hoping it will get over whatever it's problem is, or at least make it to the resting season. The leaves are supposed to all fall off during the dormant season anyways. The plant is also kind of top heavy and it sort of wiggles around a bit, so maybe the roots tips got damaged before they could get into the moss. We maybe should have put a wad of moss around the base of it where the new roots were hanging out like we do for the other orchids. Maybe we were just idiots on this one! :) Well maybe if the current live growth dies, the old ones might still be able to make a new one next year.  This was really kind of disappointing because we were excited about the resting orchids, because they require basically no work for a few months out of the year. We thought maybe catasetums would be our new thing. Maybe not.

Maxillaria tenuifolia or Coconut Orchid

We got this and the Catasetum I will write about next at an Orchid nursery we just decided to pop into during a trip to St. Petersburg, FL. The place mostly had stuff we weren't really looking for, but we hadn't really seen anything like this before. They divided a large maxillaria for us and we got half of it bare root. It was growing in moss in a plastic pot at the place, but we planted it into a clay pot in moss. We have mostly been growing it with our Phals and Oncidiums wherever it fits on the table. I think it might like a tiny bit more light though because once it started getting more light recently all the new growths that had been sort of suspended and waiting started to go. I'm not sure about that- it's just a theory. There are lots of new growths elongating now. This plant has a very interesting growth habit. We water it when it gets mostly but not completely dried out as tested by sticking my finger down into the moss. We often water it once per week, but sometimes it goes longer up to two weeks. We saw some of these blooming at the Redland Orchid Festival this May, but ours hasn't bloomed yet.

Pleione formosana and their unfortunate demise

We also got these at the Venice Orchid Show in February 2013, but they didn't survive. We got three "nuggets" as I was calling them. We had read about them in an old issue of the AOS magazine, and thought they were really cool and lovely. We were so excited to find them. We planted them in a 1" deep maybe 5" round saucer like pot with holes in the bottom. We filled it with sphagnum and tucked the nuggets about half way into the moss. We kept the moss evenly moist. The nuggets started growing right away. Two of them made growths out the side that turned into flowering spikes, and one of them made leaves out the top center of the nugget and didn't flower. The flowers were beautiful and lasted a week or two. The nuggets then started making leaves out the sides like they were making a new pseudobulb, and the other one made leaves and roots from the top of the nugget. The leaves seemed to be doing well at first, but then they started to look a little shrively. We read about them some more that they grow on rocks with humus like leaf litter in cool temperate forests. We tried to take the nuggets out and mix perlite in with the moss to give more drainage. We didn't realize there were so many roots in the medium, so that really disturbed them and they did not like that at all. That, I think, pretty much spelled their doom. The nuggets were kind of rotting and it just got worse and worse until the leaves were totally shriveled and the nuggets were totally rotten. We had to throw it all away by the end of May when we moved to Chicago. We still aren't really sure what exactly went wrong. We think it just needed more drainage. We think if we ever plant them again we will do a similar pot with some stones and try to get some leaf litter humus from the woods to put around the rocks.


Leptotes bicolor

So we are kind of into miniatures. It's sort of like baby shoes being the cutest thing on earth because they are so tiny even if you aren't that into babies. Leptotes is a miniature that we got at the Venice Orchid Show in February 2013. It wasn't in flower then, and hasn't flowered since. It was and still is planted in a 1" clay pot in sphagnum because it's so small it still dries out quickly. The plant has put on a lot of new growths, although you can hardly tell because the whole thing is so small! I often water it by spraying it because it's so tiny it's hard for water to soak in quickly. If it dries out too much I sometimes have to soak it to get it to absorb water again. I think we will have to repot it soon, because it is starting to grow over the edge on one side of it's pot. The guy who sold it to us said to grow it just like a cattleya, so that's what we have been doing. It gets good light and dries out between waterings.

Cattleya aurantiaca

We bought this lovely species orchid at the Venice Orchid Show in February 2013. We got it because it was a species and because we didn't have anything orange. It was flowering when we got it, and another spike opened up on another growth shortly thereafter as well. It came to us in a 4" square plastic pot. It's not growing out of the pot at all, so we haven't repotted it. It has made a lot of nice new roots, and is presently making 2 nice new growths. It's potted in standard bark mix, and it gets watered when it dries out all the way. Normally that is once a week. When it's really hot and it has been a couple of days since I last watered, I often spray the top a bit to keep the new roots happy. Normally the misting dries up within a few hours. We do this to most of the plants when it's hot and they aren't ready to be watered yet. We use spray with Grow or Bloom booster depending on what the plant is up to. It gets a good amount of light, but not quite as much as the single leaved cattleyas. THe double leaved types seem to prefer slightly less sun. It probably gets a couple of hours of direct sun and at least a couple hours of indirect light. When we got it the oldest two pseudobulbs had a little bit of brown spotting on them and the leaves were slightly yellowish. It seemed to stay the same for a long time, so we left them alone. A few weeks ago though the leaves started to get more yellow, so we cut off those two pseudobulbs at their base. Probably we will be looking at repotting the aurantiaca next year due to size and also because the plastic pot tips over all the time and is annoying. It appears that there may be a flower sheath in one of the new growths! Hopefully we can re-bloom it. That is always the challenge!


Thursday, July 4, 2013

Phalaenopsis amabalis

We bought this species orchid from the Venice Orchid Show in February 2013. We got it because we think species orchids are interesting, the seller said it was a really prolific flowerer, it makes kikis which is just cool, and we only had one Phal. It was in flower when we bought it, and they lasted a really long time. It was potted in moss in a 4" clear plastic pot. We left it alone until it finished flowering. I sprayed the roots that were hanging all out of the pot everyday so they didn't shrivel up and die. The leaves and roots just seemed to be looking slightly starved for water. Once we repotted it into a 6" clay pot with moss, tucking all the roots into the pot, it really started to plump back up and look good. It is making two new leaves and looks really good. When we got it the bottom two leaves were in the process of turning yellow and falling off, which is still underway, but is otherwise really healthy looking. We water it when the moss is almost all the way dried out, and fertilize every time we water with either Dyna Gro- Grow or Dyna Gro-Bloom when it's in spike or flower. So far this plant has been like other Phals- pretty easy. We haven't had it very long so it hasn't tried to flower again. I like that it's lovely in a simple way. We don't actually keep it in the bathroom, but on the porch with the other babies. It was in there during the winter when it had to come inside for a few days. It now lives in the mini greenhouse with the others.


Brassavola nodosa

We got this orchid from the Sarasota Orchid Show. We had been on the look out for one of these because we thought it was really cool that they are moth pollinated and smell good at night. We only had a couple of orchids with any scent at all. It was in flower when we got it, and has been more or less continuously in bloom since then. It's going to be in strong contention with the little red and yellow mini catt pretty soon for most ridiculously prolific flowering. It was in a tiny little 2inch pot when we bought it with half the plant hanging over the edge of the pot. We repotted it into a 6" wooden basket after it finished flowering the first time. We had to sort of lay it on it's side to get the roots in the basket because it had been climbing vertically. We potted it into the standard bark mix with a bit of moss on top to keep new roots more moist. It has been doing really well. It made a few new growths (I think it is focusing too much on flowering rather than on growing). I mist it when it's hot and dry just to dampen the top layer a bit. We have been growing it with our large single leaved cattleyas, and it seems to like that just fine. It doesn't seem as susceptible to too much sun as much as some of the others, probably because the leaves are so narrow and thick skinned.

Possible oops on the Dendrobium spectabile repotting

We repotted this spectabile back into the same pot because we were worried that it was staying too wet because the mix was old or had too much moss in it. We had two little new growths just starting, and because the plant is so big we managed to bust off both of them. That was really upsetting. We also cut off the oldest few back bulbs and potted them separately to see if they grow. Now the leaves on all the oldest pseudobulbs are turning yellow and falling off. I am hoping this is just repotting stress, but I am freaking out a little that we f-ed it up. I really hope it doesn't keep spreading. We had to manhandle it quite a bit to get all the nasty old moss out of the root ball. I think it might have been happier if we had just left it alone.