# Stupid, stupid, stupid...



## Candace (Jul 16, 2008)

A forum friend traded a few plants with me last year. I received the Paph. Francisco Fierre (Ang-thong x suk) and potted it in semi hydro on 11/07. We go through a lot of yogurt and I've been recycling the containers to use for my plants. I don't know what happened, this is the first time I've done this, but I forgot to put in drain holes. I've been watering and fertilizing the same as my other orchids. Today I was walking through the g.h. and I happened to notice some of the leca floating and water up to the base of the plant. I couldn't believe it! It's been growing in water for 8 months! Not only did it not rot, but it's in spike! It's growing new roots and although I didn't dump it out, it looks like it's fine.:crazy: It's even got a new growth coming and the old growth is still hanging on. Oh, yeah I poked drain holes in it. I'm very surprised that it's so healthy. Bad Mama, bad, bad Mama!


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## Ron-NY (Jul 16, 2008)

big mistake...if it was happy, why change things...now it is going to dimp for you


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## Heather (Jul 16, 2008)

I thought the same as Ron, haha! Sorry Candace...You were growing so well, girl!


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## Rick (Jul 16, 2008)

It just broke it in fasteroke:oke:


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## John M (Jul 16, 2008)

Ignorance is bliss, Candace! If this was an experiment and you'd known that it was swimming like a water lily all this time, it would've rotted on you long ago!


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## rdlsreno (Jul 16, 2008)

It happens to all of us Candace! Good thing you caught it!


Ramon


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## Candace (Jul 16, 2008)

I'm interested in seeing what all the water and fertilizer build up of 8 mos. will do to the bloom!


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## PaphMadMan (Jul 17, 2008)

That plant is obviously suffering and you are an unfit orchid-mother. You should send it to me immediately. oke:


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## NYEric (Jul 17, 2008)

I'm suprised! Quite beautiful foliage also!


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## Corbin (Jul 17, 2008)

Isn't amazing how nature adapts?


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## biothanasis (Jul 17, 2008)

Mistakes are for people!!!! Good thing everything turned out great!!!! Do not blame yourself at all!!!!! Keep walking...


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## swamprad (Jul 17, 2008)

Could it be that all the conventional wisdom is not necessarily correct?

I have a local friend who grows his award winning phals in sterilized peat moss (i.e. dirt) and keeps them sopping wet at all times. He has performed experiments, and says that root rot is caused by soil borne (not air borne) bacteria (or was it fungi? I forget which). His medium, sterilized in some sort of lab-type device (he is a scientist), is bacteria free and his phals never rot and grow like weeds. Furthermore, he grows them bunched in tightly together in plastic covered frames (like Wardian cases) , approximately 4'x4'x4', in his greenhouse. They have NO air movement at any time, stay sopping wet at close to 100% humidity. He's been doing this for years with great success. His only slippers are a flask of Phrag. Jason Fischer, now huge plants growing right there with the phals. 

I'm not trying to promote his methods, I'm just saying that the conventional wisdom may not be entirely correct. Just something to think about.


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## Gilda (Jul 17, 2008)

Wow, tough paph !!.. a division of my Phrag schlimii did not survive the no hole method :sob:


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## Candace (Jul 17, 2008)

Gilda, did you make a booboo too or was it an experiment?


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## SlipperFan (Jul 17, 2008)

Hardly a bad orchid mom if it is growing new roots and has a spike!


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## paphioboy (Jul 17, 2008)

> Hardly a bad orchid mom if it is growing new roots and has a spike!



I agree, Dot... Candace, you must have really green fingers to have everything growing so nicely despite less than apprpriate conditions..  Can't wait to see the bloom...


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## Gilda (Jul 17, 2008)

Candace said:


> Gilda, did you make a booboo too or was it an experiment?



No experiment...a bad senior moment ...actually my hubby did it. I let him repot and take a division from my mother plant. He used a cup that didn't have holes and didn't find out till the plant died. Thankfully, the mother plant went back in the original pot !


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## streetmorrisart (Jul 17, 2008)

That's pretty funny--what's the lesson here, more water and greenhouse conditions?!  I should be drenching, and turning up the fans and humidifiers, not reading. (I'm kidding, kind of.) Nice leaves by the way--I love the silvery ones with the dark mottling (any mottling really).


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## NYEric (Jul 18, 2008)

Candace's swimming pools for paphs! oke:


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## Ray (Jul 19, 2008)

Well Candace, you just reinvented Rod Venger's "Water Culture"!!!

I guess another way to think of it is that it was semi-hydroculture, but with a very deep reservoir!


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## John M (Jul 19, 2008)

I once grew a Phal seedling up into an enormous flowering plant by placing it on top of a wire grid over a tall, 4" diameter, glass flower vase full of water. Sorry, this was pre-digital camera days and I don't have a photo. I also had an aquarium airstone bubbling 24/7. The base of the plant was just touching the water and the massive root system that developed over a period of about 2 years, went down through the grid into the water. The plant grew from about a 3" leafspan to a monster with a 20" leafspan and 6 huge leaves. The first flowering was spectacular and had multiple side branches. I killed the plant when the air pump died and I decided to pot the plant in my regular Phal mix and treat it like the others. It liked aquaculture so much, that regular Phal culture killed it. After potting, it suddenly got crown rot and dumped all it's leaves within about a week from the first to drop to the last.

Right now I've got a Cattleya gaskelliana growing in a pickle jar with no drainage. I'll take a photo and post it if anyone is interested. There's no airstone this time. I only allow about an inch of water to sit in the bottom; but, there is no potting medium. The plant is bare-root, just sitting in the water. I change the water 2 or 3 times a week. Unfortunately, the plant is now too big to get it out of the pickle jar without breaking the jar! 

I've also got a Papilionanthe (Vanda) teres that is potted; but, has only one or two roots in the pot, most of the rest are air roots. However, some of them have grown down and into a tray of water that I use to propagate tropical waterlilies. Once those roots got into the water, the plant really took off! 

There is definately good reason to experiment with water culture for orchids (using expendible plants....just in case!). As Candace has shown us, there could be some surprizing successes.


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## JeanLux (Jul 19, 2008)

John M said:


> I once ...
> 
> Right now I've got a Cattleya gaskelliana growing in a pickle jar with no drainage. *I'll take a photo and post it if anyone is interested*. There's no airstone this time. I only allow about an inch of water to sit in the bottom; but, there is no potting medium. The plant is bare-root, just sitting in the water. I change the water 2 or 3 times a week. Unfortunately, the plant is now too big to get it out of the pickle jar without breaking the jar!
> 
> ....



Please, yes!!! Jean


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## John M (Jul 19, 2008)

"Please, yes!!!"

Ha, ha, ha! I went down to the greenhouse to water (without my camera), after making that post and I realized what a stupid comment for me to make! Of course, at least one person was going to want to see it. I would! So, I decided that I'll take a photo anyway and post it. Right now though, it's dark and there's a big storm coming; but, these days, storms pass quickly. So, maybe I'll get the photo taken today and posted.....if not, I'll do it tomorrow.


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## NYEric (Jul 19, 2008)

Water is the way!


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## John M (Jul 19, 2008)

To see the photos, have a look for "Water culture" in the Non-Slipper Orchid discussion section.


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## moonieromance (Aug 2, 2008)

Candace, very nice growing and what a serendipitous event!!! 

Is that coarse or fine grade PrimeAgra?


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## practicallyostensible (Aug 2, 2008)

moonieromance said:


> Candace, very nice growing and what a serendipitous event!!!
> 
> Is that coarse or fine grade PrimeAgra?



Haven't seen you 'round these parts before. Welcome, welcome.


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## Candace (Aug 3, 2008)

> Is that coarse or fine grade PrimeAgra?



I use the larger size leca. It's either the old Prime Agra that Ray doesn't sell anymore or leca I bought from Crop King.


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## cassie (Aug 4, 2008)

I know that I am new to the forum but as I mentioned in my welcome speech I grow a paph hydroponically in a vase of water. It gets a small amount of fetilizer every other week 20-20-20. It likes it very much new leaves and roots. I think that as long as the roots are completely covered with water they will not rot, as it takes air to rot. 

cassie


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