Phal. violacea var. alba II is growing

Phal. violacea var. alba II had her newest leaf damaged and cut off. Now there is a new leaf start:



Aerial root that appeared stalled on arrival now shows active green point.
I guess it is adjusting well to my environment.

Can't wait for orchidarium to get here so I wouldn't have to run around all these humidity trays (rolling eyes).

Psychopsis versteegiana update

My small psycho seedling grew a nice and cute pseudobulb with clean perfect leaf:



Old leaves got some black patches that don't spread but do look quite ugly, so this new clean leaf is a good sign. I do make sure to keep it away from the sun because leaves get scorched by it a lot.

New bulb also got some nice roots:



I wonder how far from blooming this guy stands.

PS. Picture of the ugly black patches on the older leaves to follow up the conversation in the comments area. What is it?

Bulbophyllum ambrosia update

After discovering scale on bulbo ambrosia, it was isolated from other orchids and wiped with alcohol several times.
Good thing - there is not much to wipe, no creases or crevises.



Looks like scale was successfully eradicated.

New bulb grows healthy and happy followed by the group of nice fresh roots:



Life is good again!

Here is a close up of the sphagnum moss soaked with water:



I just thought it was kind of cool...

Laelia tenebrosa II problem

This purplish-brownish patch on the pseudobulb of my new laelia tenebrosa. I was thinking it is a sunburn:



When I received the plant, I put it on my south-east window with other catts and this pseudobulb was looking directly on the sun. Well, I never saw sunburns on my cattleyas, but it does look like a patch on one of my vanda seedlings that got burned by sun for sure. On the other hand, as far as my knowledge extends - it might be some nasty rot.
So, at this point I am not sure if I should leave it alone or is it better to cut off the pseudobulb in question or even throw away the whole plant(I would like to avoid this option though).

Any suggestions, please?

On a happy note - there are multiple roots starts on the newest pseudobulb that is healthy for now:

Paphiopedilum wenshanense

After blasting a perfect bud in sheath on the main fan (right part of the plant) paph wenshanense took a break and didn't grow anything for a while.
Now I am noticing slight increase in the size of the second growth(left part of the plant).



This brachy paph species was considered a natural hybrid of concolor and bellatulum for a while, but then was given a status of the species on its own.

As all brachypetalums it is supposed to be finicky, but it doesn't give too much trouble to me. Bud blasting was totally my fault: during mites attack I was spraying all my paphs with miticide continuosly leaving too much of it standing in the sheath creases. Two paphs took a hit and blasted buds at that point - wenshanense and emersonii.
To be honest I was more sorry for the emersonii bud because it is so slow growing that I might be not around to see the next bud forming and wenshanense looks good even without flowers with nicely mottled leaves.

Anyway, just wanted to log the progress...

Vanda coerulea

The blue vanda species - Vanda coerulea. It doesn't need to grow huge to flower, my plant is blooming sized:



It does need however to grow some new roots.

Vanda coerulea is relatively slow growing species and might put out just one set of new leaves through the season.

Tolerant of colder temps it can withstand down to 5-10 C - just goes dormant and stops the growing.

I read somewhere that it needs temperature drops to induce blooms and hope to achieve it by placing plant on the windowsil closer to window glass during freezing winter times.
We shall see if it works.

Phalaenopsis amboinensis var. yellow

Looks like Phal. amboinensis var.yellow had pretty tough times before it got here. Roots are rotted, leaves are damaged in several places. I wasn't sure if I should waste my time with it or no.



Since it is a var. yellow that you don't see very often, I decided to give it a chance. I have potted it into smallest clay pot with sphagnum moss and just let it be, watering when moss becomes crusty dry.
Now there are some new roots and maybe it will survive after all:

Paphiopedilum purpuratum

This is a new fan growing on Paphiopedilum purpuratum.



Main plant was having some rot problems from the beginning where I was cutting brown piece of the leaf then the edge would get brown again, I would cut more, it'd get brown more. I was ready to throw away the whole thing when I noticed a small nubbing of new fan. Now it grew to this size, so I decided to log the plant in.
Here are the remains of the main plant - two brown pieces:



There are also two more new green entities(future fans or roots, I don't know yet) down at the base, they prevent me from trying to cut off the old brown pieces.

Now, the new fan has some brown edging on the bottom leaf too, so I might still end up throwing the whole thing away, but not just yet.

Dendrobium cochliodes is growing

I was very skeptical about these dendro cochliodes seedlings since my previous attempt with den. antennatum seedling of the same size ended very sad.
This time instead of net pot with sphagnum, I potted them into clay pots with chc.

Not sure if these seedlings are stronger, or chc is better for them or it is just a matter of occasional luck, but all of them are still alive, growing new roots and one of them even started something that looks like a new cane to me:



I am still keeping my fingers crossed, but these little activity signs are pretty encouraging.

Paphiopedilum malipoense

Paph. malipoense finished blooming some time ago. There was no activity in any growth and I was wondering if it maybe supposed to have a rest after blooming. However I continued to water and fertilize it regularly.
Now there are some nubs at the plants base:



When I noticed them for the first time I wasn't sure if they are roots or new fans. Now it looks like the growth on the left is a new fan. Still not sure what the others are...

Recovering angraecum

This summmer I decided to put Angraecum sesquipedale outside so it could take some temp differences and maybe initiate blooms.
That was a bad decision because I totally forgot about it and didn't water for couple weeks in hot and dry weather.
After discovering dehydrated angraecum, I took it back inside. Roots were all dry. I repotted it adding some chc to the bark mix.

It was standing there doing noting for couple months, I was wondering if it is going to die or recover, but now I can see a new root above the media.
I think it decided to recover:

Laelia alaorii update

I was kind of nervous that tiny small Laelia alaorii will dry out on its mount, so I decided to pot it together with the mount into chc to keep some humidity around the roots.
Here is how it looks like:



While doing that I noticed little new pseudobulb that started to grow there:



Hopefully it will lead to more new roots and nice establishment on that mount.

Vanda coerulea x Christensonia vietnamica

The cross between Vanda coerulea and Christensonia vietnamica is not registered anywhere. I am not even sure how the flowers would look, but hoping for something interesting.



The plant itself is very small, but mature, since there is an old dried spike, although location of this old spike is strange - usually vanda spike appears between third and fourth leaves on one side from the top of the plant. This one sits between second and third leaves, but maybe it is normal for such a cross.

The roots are very sparse, so there will be some time before it re-establishes and will be ready to bloom for me.
Due to very small size this vandaceous is a candidate for a spot in my new orchidarium (when it will get here) on the top shelf close to lights which might be too bright for phals.

Cattleya schilleriana adjusting

I got Cattleya schilleriana at the end of September potted into plastic pot with sphagnum, so I really needed to repot it. But since they are known to be quite sensitive to repotting during the wrong time of the year (fall is wrong, spring is right) - I was somewhat worried about its adjustment.
Apparently worried for nothing. Newest pseudobulb started to grow several roots at once.



Another observation - the newest leaves are getting more reddish purple in color then when it just arrived. I am not sure if it is supposed to be or plant gets too much sun and I should move it to a shadier spot.



Plant descriptions on the web mention that leaves undersides are purple, but in my case it is the surface too. I don't know...

Vanda pumila

The small group of Vanda pumila plants on a piece of wood grew a lot of new roots since the last update.



Even though they are mounted and supposed to be watered every day, I must admit that sometimes I do forget about them, but they never complained.



I am wondering how far they are from blooming size.

Neofinetia update

Last time I posted about some new growth in between leaves on my Neofinetia falcata 'Shojo'. Somewhere deep down I was hoping that it looked like a spike.
Well, it turned to be just another new fan, which of course is good too.



Now there are two new fans growing, the plant becomes clumpier and bigger.



Here is the picture from January 2012 - when it arrived here:



I think it did pretty good job growing, didn't it?

Paphiopedilum emersonii new leaf

Now this is a very slow growing slipper. It started a new fan about a year ago. It seemed that there was no progress at all, I thought the new growth will stay with two smallish leaves forever.



Finally I can see the third leaf peeking out now. There is also a second new fan start became visible and some little green spot that might be a third new fan, if I am really lucky:



I am not sure if this growth rate is worth the space this plant is taking...

Vanda tessellata potting

Finally I was able to curl the roots of Vanda tessellata into the clay pot.
I used the same potting method as with my Vanda insignis - plastic net pots in between roots to hold them in place and then a layer of sphagnum moss just at the top to hold some moisture:



Will see if it works out, I am really tired of the vase method.

This vanda got lots of dark spots on the leaves which makes her look sort of rough. I think I spoiled the foliage when scale attacked my ascda and I washed all vandas in the dish soap water.
Then direct sun added more damage and now some of my vandas don't look all that perfect.
The new couple leaves that came out on Vanda tessellata after treatment look ok, so I hope it is not totally ruined.

Dtps. Anna-Larati Soekardi

Dtps. pulcherrima x Phal. parishii = Dtps. Anna-Larati Soekardi



Yet another phal with cute flowers to be.

Phal. bellina 'blue' x sib.

Even though plant is very small and has damage on the newest leaf - I am very excitied about this little seedling.
Not only is it bellina, but a BLUE bellina.



The hole in the leaf looks like some slug damage, I can tell because I had the same hole on my masdie and found a slug in the pot.



Yellow bottom leaf is hopefully just a normal aging process when old seedling leaves just shed away. Two new roots look promising, hope they will continue to grow.

Vanda insignis

Mature plant of Vanda insignis potted into sphagnum moss...




No, don't worry, it is not sphagnum moss all the way to the bottom.
I actually found this method of potting vandas here.
I thought it would work for me because while my seedlings in small pots are fine with chc - this vanda has pretty wide spread roots that require large pot. Chc in that pot would probably dry forever, so I did as described in the post I mentioned above.

Curled the roots into pot and placed bunch of small net plastic pots in between:



Put a layer of sphagnum moss to top it up:



Now I need to make sure it dries up in about 3 to 4 days, that's how often I water my other vandas in chc and they like it.

Strange flowering of haraella

I am not even sure if it is a flower or not, but it does appear on one of the Haraella retrocalla spikes and did develop like a bud at the beginning:






Here is the story.
This haraella did bloom normally last winter. After blooming I cut all the spikes and placed it into low light location to encourage some leaves and roots growing and stop it from continuous blooming.
Haraella produced several new leaves and many roots, but then it did throw two new spikes.
Now I think that I should have moved it into brighter light when I noticed the spikes, but I didn't. So, maybe this strange underdeveloped bloom is result of the low light supply. At least that's what I am blaiming it on.
If there is more proper explanation - I would like to know it.
I didn' use any chemicals or hormons on this plant except ocasional watering with quarter strength solution of balanced 20-20-20 fertilizer that I use on all my orchids.
I am puzzled...

Vanda tricolor

A very small seedling of vanda tricolor - since my main interest is still vanda species.




I already have a seedling of Vanda suavis which is actually Vanda tricolor var. suavis. This one is supposed to be different, although I will not know for sure another 5 years at least.

If you want to train your patience - buy a small seedling of vanda.

Near death of Liu's Rainbow

I was wondering why this little guy didn't grow anything through the summer when all other orchids were bursting with new leaves and roots.
After unpotting I got explanation - it was busy rotting the roots, not without my help of course.
Here is what left:



I have peeled away all mushy stuff leaving some inner strings - they will help to anchor the plant in the media. Then I potted it into smallest net pot with sphagnum moss:



It would help if it was summer with warmer temperatures now. Hopefully it will survive.

Dtps. Liu's Cute Angel

Dtps. Jiaho Cherry x Phal. lobbii = Dtps. Liu's Cute Angel



I find all crosses with lobbii or parishii just adorable. Plant is small but sturdy with nice roots. Since lobbii is a mini, I don't expect it to grow very large and maybe my little plant is actually a bloom sized one.

Oh no! Pests.

Heavy pest attack on my small Bulbophyllum ambrosia:



What the heck are they - scale or mealybugs, or evil combination of the two?



I was re-potting it last week and was so excited about new roots growth that didn't pay attention to the start of this invasion. That's annoying -should be more attentive next time.

I pulled plant out of the basket, scrubbed all bulbs with toothbrush and 70% rubbed alcohol, washed basket with dishsoap and repotted into fresh sphagnum.
Isolated plant from other orchids and will keep a close eye - if they will come back.
Hope not.

Phal. violacea alba II

Second plant of Phalaenopsis violacea var. alba. It is smaller than the other one and had some leaf problem.
It seems ok now, so I am logging it in: