Two haraellas

Looks like both of my haraellas are establishing well on their mounts.

The larger one finished blooming and I was glad to see couple of green tips on the roots and activated spindly old spikes. It had some moss around the roots at first but I noticed signs of rot under moss, so I took it off and just water it twice a day.






The smaller one is on the large piece of driftwood with couple phal. seedlings. All the roots have active growth points and just recently it started a new leaf.
Haraella retrocalla II:

Laelia purpurata v. carnea

This variety of laelia purpurata has coral lip instead of usual lavender. There are two seedlings but I am logging them under one name because I am not sure if both of them will make it due to the roots conditions.

Phalaenopsis lobbii

I took Phal lobbii off the driftwood mount. I don't think it liked it there: at first it seemed that roots were too dry, the spikes dried out too, so I covered roots with moss, but then noticed whitish-gray mold growing under plant. I freaked out, scraped the mold with alcohol and decided to just pot phal lobbii like all the other small phals.
Here it is now. There are no spikes anymore.

Repotting phals

These two phalaenopsis plants were potted into clay pots with sphagnum moss.
The pots were about 4 inch and I noticed that moss stayed wet too long. Both still have nice healthy roots at the moment. I decided to move them into bark mix and clear plastic pots so I could monitor the roots better. Here they are in the new pots.
Phalaenopsis fasciata 'Shaffers'



and Dtps. Freed's Beautiful Girl 'Blue' X Phal Equestris 'Alba'

Laelia purpurata

Small seedling, not in best conditions because of the rotted roots. Pseudobulbs look healthy, so I do hope that new roots will grow, they usually do, but not always.

B. Little Stars spike

The flower spike on Brassavola Little Stars grew up some more and now it doesn't look like a bud but more like a bean pod. I wonder how long before it will actually look like something that is going to bloom.

Vanda bensonii

Cutting of Vanda bensonii got some nice new roots going in the basket with coconut husk chips. Because I was going to grow it in a vase, I decided to move her there now before roots grow wide to the sides and would need to be pushed and curled to fit. Now they can be nicely shaped by the vase.

Phalaenopsis wilsonii

I don't know much about this species. It doesn't have a lot of leaves and one of those is getting yellow, but I read that Phal wilsonii might just loose the leaves seasonally, so I don't worry for now.
I have it in a smallest clay pot with sphagnum moss and let the sphag dry out completely before watering as with all my other phals.

Vanda testacea

Apparently not all vandas like it in the glass vase. After having Vanda testacea bare rooted I thought it was too dry for her and put it into glass bowl where its roots could curl up nicely and watered it together with other vase vandas by filling vase with water every day. After couple months it lost several bottom leaves on both growths because they rotted at the base.
I was so scared that I will loose the plant because of crown rot, so I moved it to the wide clay pot without any media.



Will see how it goes there, hopefully it will have chance to dry out better.

Phalaenopsis bellina ('Ingrid Ohh' x 'Joy' AM/AOS)

Just recently I was complaining that my Phalaenopsis bellina ('Ingrid Ohh' x 'Joy' AM/AOS) just sits there doing nothing. Well I guess she took a hint and quickly produced a new root. Now let's see if a new leaf will follow :).

Vanda tessellata update

Large division of Vanda tessellata came from Ten Shin Gardens on the Montreal show in October. It had only two long roots growing awkwardly up. I had to twist and turn and curl them back into vase and didn't do a very good job -cracked both at the base and thought they are goners.
After almost two months here it looks ok in the vase, grew new leaf and look at all the new roots starts!



I had peeled some of the bottom leaves so they are not squished in the vase and now there is some space for new roots.

Laelia tenebrosa

This is a compot (community pot) of two small seedlings of Laelia tenebrosa. I got it about a year or so ago and those little babies are so slow. Seems like they didn't change at all.

Vandas potted into clay pots

As I am getting more and more vandas and watering them every day in a vase becomes a full time job, I decided to experiment with potting them.
For experiment I have chosen two adult ones - Ascda Princess Mikasa and V. Roberts Delight because:
- they have strong foliage and look pretty robust comparing to seedlings;
- they are pretty common and will be easier to replace then my vanda species if something goes wrong;
- they were in the largest vases and required the most work to water everyday.
So, I trimmed the roots to curl them into unglazed clay pots. Put lots of packing p-nuts to about half pot depth and topped them with a haNdful of large bark pieces for asda and chc for vanda.
I am planning to water them every third day but will mist the exposed roots daily. After sometime I might modify this routine. Hope it will work.
Here is what came out of it:

More pics from Montreal show in October

I found some pictures I took at Montreal orchid show in October that I didn't post yet. Here they are:

Haraella retrocalla II

Haraella retrocalla II is a little piece of plant that came off the main Haraella retrocalla when I unwrapped it on arrival. The little one was already featured in the post about my driftwood mounting with multiple plants, but it is almost not visible on the picture, so I decided to log it in separately so I could better monitor its progress(or decline).
Haraella retrocalla II has nice tiny but healthy roots:



After couple days on the mount I noticed that plants are drying out too fast especially during the night - heat is working, kitchen is not used = drier air.
I covered roots with cozy blanket of sphagnum, it feels better now:



Hope she will grow, and mature, and will bloom for me some time soon...

Phragmipedium pearcei

My first trial phrag - Phragmipedium pearcei spent here over a month and to my pleasant surprise is still alive.




Through the clear plastic pot walls I can see newly appearing fresh growing tips on several roots. They weren't there on arrival. Here are couple:



Here is one too:



I gather - it is OK with my care.
Potted into clear plastic pot with Shultz orchid mix it gets watered twice a week with rain water.
I leave shallow water in the saucer after each watering and it stands there until the next one. It was scary at first as I was sure the roots will rot, but several internet sources claim that pearcei likes to stay moist, so I took a chance.
Another update will follow in a month or so...

Paphiopedilum delenatii update

Old fan on Paph delenatii got so unattractively brownish-yellow, that I decided to cut it off. The cut is quite visible in front of the newer fan that is producing new leaf:



While fussing around it, my curious mind wanted to see what is going on in the pot under the chc surface. Without much thinking I pulled the plant out of the pot and was thrilled to discover two gorgeous new fuzzy roots growing out of the rotted/dried roots mess I saw last time.
Giant piece of chc stuck to them, I didn't want to disturb the roots and didn't take it off for the pictures:



View from the side:



Looks like couple of my paphs decided to give me a second chance :).

After some reading and going through the google images, it turned out that I really like the paphs of parvisepalum type (which explains why beside delenatii I have also micranthum and emersonii). There are few other parvisepalum species and primary hybrids I would like to add to my collection soon.

Psychopsis versteegiana

I was going to water my Psychopsis versteegiana and noticed some fattening under the sheath on one of the existing pseudobulbs.
When the sheath was carefully peeled away (probably shouldn't have done it, but couldn't help it), I discovered something that looks like a new pseudobulb start:



It is a great news - means that my psycho seedling is adjusting well to my care and environment.

Brassavola Little Stars spike

The spike on B. Little Stars grew a bit more, but it started to strangely come out to the side. Does it follow the light maybe? I moved it farther from the window glass to protect from cold, but now it gets less light, perhaps spike is trying to reach sun. Also it looks sort of yellowish, maybe it is drying out and blasting?

Dreadful scale on ascocenda

I didn't finish yet to enjoy the blooms of my new Ascda Princess Mikasa Blue - and here comes the trouble - scale. The worst thing I had on my orchids before - mealies on the Angraecum sesquipedale that came ironically from the show too. Now - Princess with scale.
First I saw it on the flowers - brownish round shell covering small insect sucking the life out of my blooms:



Close inspection of each leaf revealed one more bug:



There was also some big bug on the flowers too. I don't know if it is related to scale - maybe he eats them(?), here it is:



I cut off the flowering stem completely and threw it away, scraped with alcohol the bug on the leaf and gave whole plant a warm bath in the water with dishwashing liquid bubbles. I don't know if soapy water wll kill the roots, but they were in the bath too.

Disturbing thought about other orchid in close proximity made me put my V. Robert's Delight through the soapy bath too (just in case). Both of them are somewhat isolated from other 'chids.

I read that scale is hard to get rid of without chemicals. Will see if it is true, maybe should go buy some insecticide. Oh, bother...

During research I found this great visual presentation on many orchid pests here: Pests of Orchids

Phalaenopsis Kuntrarti Rarashati 'Copperstate' HCC/AOS

Vanda Gordon Dillon Blue

Here is the newest addition to my collection of blue vandas. Small seedling of Vanda Gordon Dillon Blue came with nice and healthy roots. It got appropriate vase and its place on the sunny windowsill:



Vanda Gordon Dillon was registered back in 1978 and is a cross between V. Madame Rattana and V. Bangkok Blue (I have seedling of that one too).

This hybrid needs to grow pretty large before it will be ready to bloom, so I am here on the long wait for flowers.

Phal. Kuntrarti Rarashati bloom

Flower just opened today and it is very pretty. I will try to make pictures in a bright day light tomorrow, maybe it will open some more. The full name of the plant is :
Phalaenopsis Kuntrarti Rarashati 'Copperstate' HCC/AOS.

Masdevallia amplexa

Masdevallia amplexa came in October from Ecuagenera. It is my first masdie that I am trying along with pharg and dracula to see if I can grow them.
I picked the amplexa specie because it is stated in several sources as the one that can tolerate warmer temperatures.



I already managed to kill all the roots, or maybe they weren't that good to start with, but there is a new growth going, so it gives me some hope.
I moved it into net pot with sphag to let it dry faster and use rain water for watering.
If anyone has tips about culture, please share. Any advice will be appreciated.

Phalaenopsis equestris orange

This is a young plant of Phalaenopsis equestris orange. The older leaf got yellow, but I hope it is normal because all other leaves look healthy an happy:



Thre is also a spike, that started under the leaf on the left:



I am really looking forward to see the flowers when/if it will decide to bloom.
I have this idea to collect all varieties of equestris, so far I have blue and orange. There is also alba that came gorgeous and healthy but lost all the roots under my care :( I am trying to save it, but it doesn't look promising enough to log it here yet.

Phalaenopsis violacea coerulea II

It is quite large but not in the best conditions. Phalaenopsis violacea coerulea has lost large leaf to rot, tips of the newer leaves were black too. I cut the tips off and put cinnamon on cuts. There is not much roots, so I was debating with myself if I should log it now or wait until it looks better. But then decided to log in everything, even the smallest seedlings.
If something doesn't make it, or gets traded, or given away - I will remove it from My Orchids list and file under Orchids archive.



Update Dec. 25, 2011.
Gone due to crown rot. Archived.

Phal. bellina alba x pulchra alba

Just a small seedling - Phalaenopsis cross of alba varieties of two fragrant species - bellina and pulchra. I really hope it survives and brings me beautiful flowers some day.

Rhynchostylis coelestis

Here is one unresponsive plant. All the other vandaceous would grow several new leaves during the time it was here. Rhynchostylis coelestis had shown the small start of new leaf and its been there for months. It doesn't grow, it doesn't die.
Is it supposed to be that slow, or it doesn't like to be in a vase and I should pot it somehow? I don't know...



I trimmed away some ugly brown roots that it initially came with, it grew some new roots but that's about it.

Mounted mini phals

Here is yet one more mounting I just created. This log of a driftwood came from the pet store too. I put several small mini-phals and one haraella baby on it. There are 4 plants in total on the mount, from left to rght they are: Phalaenopsis gibbosa seedling, Phalaenopsis parishii seedling, small seedling of Haraella retrocalla and last but not least - blooming sized Phalaenopsis lobbii with two spikes.
I put small dab of sphagnum moss under each plant. Hopefully they will be ok. I killed one Phal lobbii potted into sphagnum, this one I decided to mount.



Small Haraella retrocalla baby came off the large one when I potted it on arrival. I will label it Haraella retrocalla II.

Oncidium Sharry Baby

Is that a new growth starting on my newly purchased Onc. Sharry Baby? I think so:



And couple new roots are showing up too. I got it month ago on Montreal show and looks like it is establishing well in the new home.