# New to Roths



## masaccio (Dec 7, 2020)

Very excited, but I bit off a lot. Ordered three. Prince Edward of York (BS), Lady Roth (BS), and Angel Hair (NBS). I guess because I've been procrastinating taking this plunge for decades I went a little nuts. My LED spots have convinced me that I can grow paphs, even if not perfectly. I have two light gardens. One is just LED light (140w equivalent Crees) from a ceiling track for general paph light and miltoniopsis. I wonder if that would be enough for the Roth crosses though, unless I hiked them up. The second might be a better option. I've been growing cattleyas there. It's a northwest window supplemented by 240 equivalent LED Sylvania spots. I'm thinking downsizing those to the 140 watt equivalent Crees, plus the natural light from that window might be about right (sorry catts, they'll be moved along to friends). That window does get filtered sunlight for part of the year. I'm sorry, I know there are no actual questions here. Just wanted to invite general comments from those who have experience with these. Failure is not an option! Thanks so much.


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## Linus_Cello (Dec 7, 2020)

My experience is that multis do need more light than some other paphs. So Catt level lights are good.


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## Ozpaph (Dec 8, 2020)

I agree; cattleya level lighting (or just under) for adult multiflorals.


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## Djthomp28 (Dec 8, 2020)

I have been advised to provide Cattleya like light to my multis. I am doing that with my roth species, and they are growing very, very well. No blooms yet, but I purchased them as large seedling. It may be a while. 

Mine summered outside near the Cattleyas, but touch less light. Now they are under my bright grow light area with the Cattleya. The leaves are a light green, which concerned me. I asked several growers, including Sam Tsui, about the light and the leaf color. All said it was on target. 

I would stick with the brighter lights for multiforals.


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## masaccio (Dec 8, 2020)

Thanks for the comments everyone. One note about light for what it's worth. I can't remember where I read this, either yesterday or the day before. I was surfing lots of websites looking geneally for available paphs. Maybe it was even on this forum... Anyway, It stated that while many Corypedilums will generally adjust to cattleya level light that the blooming spikes could be stunted. So slightly under, as Ozpaph stated, might be better. Has anyone has that happen?


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## masaccio (Dec 8, 2020)

Djthomp28 said:


> I have been advised to provide Cattleya like light to my multis. I am doing that with my roth species, and they are growing very, very well. No blooms yet, but I purchased them as large seedling. It may be a while.
> 
> Mine summered outside near the Cattleyas, but touch less light. Now they are under my bright grow light area with the Cattleya. The leaves are a light green, which concerned me. I asked several growers, including Sam Tsui, about the light and the leaf color. All said it was on target.
> 
> I would stick with the brighter lights for multiforals.


Thanks very much for your note about leaf color. I also have been concerned about the lighter green color in my general paph. collection. But they seem stable and are growing well.


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## BrucherT (Dec 8, 2020)

You want the light so high that the leaves turn chartreuse, “Kinabalu Gold.” And don’t stint on the calcium. Mine grows smack against a due-south window with very light filtration. It bloomed. Leaves golden-green.


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## Guldal (Dec 8, 2020)

If you grow the plants so bright, that the leaves turn yellow or take on a marked yellowish tone, I would advice you to follow one of our (STC) canadian mastergrowers, John M's advice to keep the leaves healthy and green (i.e. keep up the chlorophyll level and thus the photosynthesis going): every time you feed add additionally 1/4 teaspoonfull Epsom Salts pr 1 ltr water.


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## Happypaphy7 (Dec 8, 2020)

Now that I have some roth hybrids in sheath, I would like to add my two cents in the discussion.
First off, regarding light, I doubt multis need particularly strong light. I know there are a handful of species (multi or not) like glanduliferum and druyi that grow almost completely exposed in the sun with some grass growing all around them but not providing shade over the plants. 
What little in-situ pictures I have seen of things like stonei, roth, anitum...all look very much typical of many other paphs that grow on rock surface with tall trees shading them with breaks of sun light coming in from canopy here and there. Some time during the day might give them more of less direct stronger light depending on the location. 
There was this report that philippinense from a certain island were strangely yellowish and I wonder if this is one of the sources where multis = a lot of light came to be?? 
I have seen nurseries growing multis along side other types of paphs just fine with dark green leaves and lots of flowers. 

Ok, so my limited experience. I only have just a few because these plants tend to get big and take up a lot of space. Plus, they are not my preferred types of paphs. I got myself some seedlings to try my hands on just out of curiosity. Also, a generous member on this forum gifted me one Wössner Black Wing. The others I have are Lady Isabel x anitum and Saint Swithin x anitum. 
I had them on the windowsill under natural light initially, but since about four years ago, I moved them under T8 set up. Typical florescent shop light stuff, not specifically made for growing plants. I have two 4ft tubes per shelve hanging over the plants with about 8inch (or more) distance between the plants and the light. Plants were initially rather small, not tiny, at about 4-5inch long leaf size. 
They grew slowly for the first three years or so, but then in the last couple of years, they started to get noticeably big. All three of these are now as big as my arms length from tip to tip. I don't fertilize them heavily. Mostly just water with occasional dilute feeding. 
Now, they are all sending up a sheath with a new growth of their own. 
Funny thing is two of them have never been repotted this whole time and the small (2.5in tall pot) pot is full of their roots and some roots are coming out over the pot. I plan on moving the plants into larger pot for stability. I would hate to break off the emerging spike after all this wait. 
The color of the leaves on my plants are pretty dark green. Definitely no hint of yellow at all. 
Ok, that's about it. 
If they bloom out decent, then, I will share the photos on the Paphiopedilum section on this forum.


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## Ozpaph (Dec 8, 2020)

I should add that I grow anitum hybrids with more shade.
When they spike i move them to more shade, more protection and a bit cooler (outdoor growing)


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## masaccio (Dec 8, 2020)

Guldal said:


> If you grow the plants so bright, that the leaves turn yellow or take on a marked yellowish tone, I would advice you to follow one of our (STC) canadian mastergrowers, John M's advice to keep the leaves healthy and green (i.e. keep up the chlorophyll level and thus the photosynthesis going): every time you feed add additionally 1/4 teaspoonfull Epsom Salts pr 1 ltr water.



I feed continually at a very low level with First Rays 12-1-1-10Ca-3Mg. Does 1/2 teaspoon of Epsom per 1 gallon of solution sound reasonable?


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## Guldal (Dec 9, 2020)

masaccio said:


> I feed continually at a very low level with First Rays 12-1-1-10Ca-3Mg. Does 1/2 teaspoon of Epsom per 1 gallon of solution sound reasonable?


I actually don't know...in your shoes, I would ask John M for advice - you are free to quote me, if you send him a pm (through the conversation feature)! Kind regards, Jens


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## Justin (Dec 9, 2020)

IME roths and their hybrids should be given Cattleya level light to bloom their best. I grow my mature plants so that the leaves are green-yellow. Water and feed heavily, including plenty of Ca and Mg. Also give thrm as much warmth and humidity as you can provide.

adductum/anitum take less light.


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## masaccio (Dec 9, 2020)

Thanks so much to everyone. This is tremendous support. I"m very grateful. 



Justin said:


> IME roths and their hybrids should be given Cattleya level light to bloom their best. I grow my mature plants so that the leaves are green-yellow. Water and feed heavily, including plenty of Ca and Mg. Also give thrm as much warmth and humidity as you can provide.
> 
> adductum/anitum take less light.


Thank you! I've been feeding constantly roughly 25PPM Nitrogen 10Ca 3Mg. Many years ago I was feeding the old school formula of 1/4 tsp of 20-20-20 per gallon and I had a lot of tip burning (the water itself was fine). Now that I'm thinking in terms of PPM, I should do an equivalency of how many PPM I was actually given. With my current formula which I give everybody all the time, I haven't noticed any problems at all. Things are growing and blooming, including standard cattleyas. Some of the yellowing is left over from when I was indeed over-lighting my lower-light plants. I was new to LEDs at the time. I have to keep reminding myself that some of the older yellow leaves were from that period before I downsized the wattage. 



Happypaphy7 said:


> Now that I have some roth hybrids in sheath, I would like to add my two cents in the discussion.
> First off, regarding light, I doubt multis need particularly strong light. I know there are a handful of species (multi or not) like glanduliferum and druyi that grow almost completely exposed in the sun with some grass growing all around them but not providing shade over the plants.
> What little in-situ pictures I have seen of things like stonei, roth, anitum...all look very much typical of many other paphs that grow on rock surface with tall trees shading them with breaks of sun light coming in from canopy here and there. Some time during the day might give them more of less direct stronger light depending on the location.
> There was this report that philippinense from a certain island were strangely yellowish and I wonder if this is one of the sources where multis = a lot of light came to be??
> ...



Thank you for offering this surprising perspective! I tend to go overboard with everything plant-related, so it's nice to hear that moderation is the way to go. I'm really shocked at your success under fluorescent tubes. I don't know why exactly - they have a great reputation with paphs. I wouldn't grow large cattleyas under the typical shop-lite style. Actually I did at one time. They held up for awhile but declined over time. 
As to philippense, that one does have a strong reputation for wanting bright light. One of the reasons I've never tried to grow it. I like it a lot though. It's on my list once I get more experience under LEDs. 
As your spike develops will you put it back in the window to finish, or raise the fluorescent fixtures or what?


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## Happypaphy7 (Dec 9, 2020)

I will move the plant to the window area once the spike is a few inches over the center of the plant. 
I do this with all my paphs with the exception of certain plants with short spike like wenshanense. 

Fluorescent tubes work great obviously. Initially, I was a bit skeptical about them, but I read a lot about them and how others did just fine with them, I took the plunge. I am happy with the results. 
I bloomed Cattleya, mini Vandas, Paphs, Phals...pretty much anything.


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## masaccio (Dec 9, 2020)




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