Ascocenda rescue

Here is an ascocenda hybrid that I am trying to revive:



It has all brown and dried up roots, the leaves are a bit dehydrated too. I put it into vase just so I can see what is going on with those old brown roots and hoping that maybe some of them still have the life inside and might produce new growth.

It resides in the kitchen beside the sink, so I would fill up the vase often having it there and wouldn't forget about it.

We will see if this rescue operation will succeed.

Oh yeah, the cross is - Ascda. Suksamran Sunlight x Khun Nok, it should have orange flowers.

Bought a humidifier

Our house is heated by the hot air outlets in the floor. Needless to say that it kills all the humidity here. We bought our house new from the builder and first year it had around 60% RH probably because there was still some moisture in the basement etc.
This year however after just a month of heating it started to drop even below 40%.

Desperate, I bought small 3 Gal. Sunbeam warm mist vaporiser to keep air moist around the orchids. But with an open concept house that didn't help much. I needed something more powerful.

After some research about humidifiers and convincing the family that we really need to create more moisture environment in the house, last weekend I bought the 9 Gal console humidifier from Honeywell. It claims to work with the house up to 2300 sq.ft. which should be enough for me.



It quickly raised humidity from 38% to 50% on the first floor and I decided to keep it there, because setting it higher might grow mold in the house. Since my phals will go into orchidarium, I hope 50% should be enough for vandas, catts and paphs.

The unit is bulky, looks pretty ugly, turns on and off automatically to keep my 50% RH and is quite noisy (especially during the night) despite the words Quiet Care written on it.
Well, maybe the other ones are even louder, we will get used to it.

Vanda Somthawil

Vanda Somthawil is a primary hybrid between Vanda merrillii and Vanda denisoniana.



The flowers will have fragrance, I am really looking forward to get this one to bloom.
I potted it the same way as all my adult vandas, net pots with sphagnum at the top.

Mounting George

Over the summer Phal. I-Hsin George has been growing long new leaves that were sort of soft and floppy. Then I noticed that they were so floppy that started to nod down.
I tried to stake it for support but ended up breaking off the whole long and soft leaf.
Luckily the newer leaf already started, so the crown was still alive, but that newer leaf was growing looking down too.
George became a problem to handle because I was constantly worried that I can break off the whole crown.
Finally I decided that if he wants to look down with his new leaves - then I should probably mount him upside down so the newest leaf will just hang there without any risk to be broken.
For a while I couldn't find a suitable and large enough piece of wood, but yesterday at PetSmart I finally came across something that could be it:



Long story short - here is the result:



It is now hanging on the railing against the window and gets a lot of light. I put some sphagnum on the mount over the roots in hopes that it will keep some humidity there.



Here is the look from below. It shows the newest leaf and traces of the broken one(there is brown cinnamon powder collected on the cut). I am guessing that spikes will probably die off because of the change-of-environment shock:



I am not sure if it was a good idea to mount I-Hsin George, just hope it won't kill him.

Vandachostylis Sri-Siam

This cute vandaceous is an intergeneric primary hybrid (is there such thing?) between Vanda tessellata and Rhynchostylis gigantea:





The roots were so much tangled into the plastic basket that I could not easily free them up without damaging. So I decided to keep the basket and just placed it into clay pot adding the sphagnum right inside the basket. Hope it will work.

Pictures of Vandachostylis Sri-Siam that I found on the web suggest that it should have nicely waxed dark red flowers with some fragrance.