# Disa Smiley Face (Pink) and Disa Firebolt (Red)



## John M (May 22, 2012)

I'm enjoying these on my kitchen windowsill at the moment. I've finally figured out the trick to Disas.......high light in the winter and massive amounts of air movement and lots of water in the summer. For the first time, I put my plants under bright lights in the basement for the winter and they have done really, really well. 

My track record with this Genus has had it's up and LOTS of downs. Since I started growing them ~about 2004, I've spent about $12,000.00 and killed about 24,000 seedlings, as I learned through trial and error. I was trying to develop them as a commercial crop. I'm not there yet; but, I have made some very important advances in cultivating them successfully. I seemed to do well for awhile; but, I'd have troubles in the summer and then again in the winter. What was left would rally back in the Spring and Fall. The summer was too hot inside the greenhouse with not enough air movement. Last summer, I was down to only about 200 plants and I tested this theory by growing some plants on the bench; plus, I put a few plants right next to the intake of my 4' exhaust fan where they got BLASTED by the air as it was pulled past the plants and out of the greenhouse. To stop desication from the "wind", I stood them in an inch of water at all times. The plants on the bench were only about 10 feet away; but, in a completely different microclimate and they suffered big losses again. The high volume of air rushing past the plants near the intake of the fan cooled them by evaporating moisture from their leaves and pots. This cooling effect was much stronger than for the ones on the bench. The plants by the fan not only survived, they flourished over the summer, even though the ambient temps were hot. The MASSIVE amount of air movement made a huge difference.

In the fall, I put them all outside to get the chill.....and many of the stressed ones rallied back. Then, I managed to frost them all! Lots of damage and some deaths! I knew that the temps were going down to 0*C or even a bit lower; so, I covered them to protect them from the frost. All the literature I've read goes on about how they survive just fine in their habitat when they experience freezing temps. Well, plants in pots don't like that! However, lots of plants did survive. The newly beat up survivors then went into the basement, not back into the greenhosue. This avoided them suffering through another long, dull winter. I put them in the basement under four, 8' long, daylight Fluorescent tubes on a table 2' wide x 8' long and completely wrapped in tinfoil to reflect all the light back onto the palnts.....nice and bright. I set the day length to be just 8 hours in December and January. Then, in February, I increased it to 16 hours and began to fertilize weakly. 

The few plants that were sickly to begin with just died off. The hot summer and frost in the fall was just too much for them. However, about half of the frost survivors were in okay shape and they flourished over the winter, especially once the day length was increased. 

The pots are 4" clay and I stand them in a puddle 24/7. I use R.O. water and foliar feed them about every two weeks once the daylength is increased up to when they bloom. Then, I stop feeding while they're in bloom and don't start again until I see new growth. They are potted in 2/3 perlite and 1/3 peatmoss.....very acidic. I think I'll add some chopped sphagnum moss and styrofoam chips when I repot in September.....just to lighten the mix a bit and make it more "fluffy". By now, the peat/perlite mix is pretty well compacted.


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## Kevin (May 22, 2012)

Wow! What colour, and what an endeavour you went through with your plants! I've also tried (and failed) with this genus. 

Do you have plans to go to see them in their native habitat? Have you ever been? I would love to go to the WOC 2014 in Johannesburgh.


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## Lanmark (May 22, 2012)

Gorgeous flowers! I'm impressed with your dedication and perseverance.


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## NYEric (May 23, 2012)

Beauties! Thanks for the info. I've killed about a dozen. Can you show what kind of peat moss is in your mix?


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## John M (May 23, 2012)

Thanks everyone. 

Kevin: No, I don't have plans to go to the WOC in 2014. I'd love to go; but that's just not going to happen. I'd love to see them in their native habitat. Maybe some day I'll have the finances and the time to go on a trip.

Eric, the peatmoss is just regular Canadian Peatmoss that I bought at a garden centre. It's nothing special or high-end.


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## JeanLux (May 23, 2012)

What a colorful team :clap: !!!! Jean


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## tenman (May 23, 2012)

Excellent job!


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## cnycharles (May 23, 2012)

huh, i posted and it disappeared. after reading here about cyp growers using a lot of the japanese media like kanuma and others using turface and things like that, i was wondering if one of those types might be good for growing disas? that and zeer pots might be helpful for those of us silly enough to keep trying to grow them. i don't feel so bad, now about how many i've bought and killed, at least you are doing it for a reason and are keeping track of your research and making positive progress


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## Shiva (May 23, 2012)

Magnificient display John. Great colors, but they are hard plants to grow. I flowered many of them years ago but was never able to keep them alive after flowering. At the time, I thought an ebb and flow system might be a good way to grow them but I never actually tried it.:clap::clap::clap:


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## Roth (May 23, 2012)

Very beautiful and very well grown plants...

Disas, I have seen once a commercial crop in Germany. The seedlings were deflasked in sphagnum platelets (Skeggs), in trays. When the leaves were about 5 cm, they were potted in Grodan Growcube rockwool, in 15cm clay pots, with two drippers per pot, constant watering, Excel CalMag at 1500 microsiements ( one thousands five hundreds, not a mistake), watered about 4 times a day for 15 minutes. They were in front of fans, but so far the leaf temperature is not important, the root temperature is. Their greenhouse went up to 35-38 celsius in summer, and the plants did just fine, because the clay pots cooled the roots, and the rockwool cooled them even way more.

In their habitat, I have seen some herschelianthe, which are basically the same, the top growth can grow warm to hot, but the roots need to be kept very cool. I still have some in Hanoi, as long as the pots are cool/cold, they do fine.

There are very few suppliers of disas so far in the world now, commercially, and the largest in South Africa, was the supplier of the German crop ( intended for pot plants). Whilst the plants were gorgeous, several varieties were heavily virused, and there were many muted plants (the SA lab makes tissue culture from flower spikes indeed...)


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## TyroneGenade (May 23, 2012)

Fantastic growing! Thanks for the inspiration. I guess I will be killing some more Disa next Summer.


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## tenman (May 23, 2012)

cnycharles said:


> huh, i posted and it disappeared. after reading here about cyp growers using a lot of the japanese media like kanuma and others using turface and things like that, i was wondering if one of those types might be good for growing disas? that and zeer pots might be helpful for those of us silly enough to keep trying to grow them. i don't feel so bad, now about how many i've bought and killed, at least you are doing it for a reason and are keeping track of your research and making positive progress



I grow mine now in straight diatomite with just a layer of aliflor in the bottom of the plastic pots to block the diatomite from running out the drainage holes. I chose it since the sphagnum I was growing them in always turned to slime and the diatomite was as close as I could get to the river sand they naturally grow in. They're in a flowtable with three one-hour floods of 50degF water 3x a day.


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## Jorch (May 23, 2012)

Great success story (and picture)! Disas are very pretty IMO and hopefully there will be more Disa success stories and pictures on this forum!


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## John M (May 23, 2012)

Thanks everyone!

For those interested in trying Disas, I have one other thing to add with regard to their successful culture. It's best to keep the humidity low and not to wet the leaves, especially in winter or anytime that the light is poor. In my greenhouse, I do a lot of misting and getting all the foliage wet. Plus, my greenhouse is naturally very humid. The disas were always very prone to rot in the greenhouse. Getting wet so often wasn't good and if they stayed wet for more than a couple hours, I'd see problems with the foliage a few days later. Also, if the humidity is high, that just makes rot a constant concern. 

The plants that I had in front of the greenhouse fan last summer dried their foliage within minutes of getting wet. Of course, the plants didn't suffer from all that air movement because the plants stood in a puddle of water 24/7. In the basement of my house, I mostly just add water to the trays that the pots are standing in. Sometimes, usually just when foliar feeding, I do spray the leaves with water. However, because the plants are in the house, where it's not as humid as the greenhouse, the foliage dries off quickly. 

So, to conclude, it has been my experience that dry foliage and lower humidity is also very important to keeping a Disa happy. The level of humidity that keeps aerial Vanda roots happy with lots of growing green tips, is death to a Disa. Also, Disa pollen is prone to fungal growth if the humidity is too high or if the flower gets wet. Of course, once the pollen begins to rot, the flower looks aweful. So again, this is another reason to keep the plant's foliage and flowers dry and in a lower humidity environment.

Actually, when you consider the things that I've come to realize about Disas, it seems to be telling me that they'd make perfect windowsill plants with just a little bit of extra consideration. A Disa planted in a clay pot, standing in some water, with a small fan blowing on it and some supplemental light during the dull weather, should be a happy camper and perform quite well.


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## John M (May 23, 2012)

TyroneGenade said:


> Fantastic growing! Thanks for the inspiration. I guess I will be killing some more Disa next Summer.



But, if you use clay pots, stand the plants in a puddle and blow a fan onto them, you'll be unsuccessful at killing your Disas.


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## KyushuCalanthe (May 23, 2012)

Those are really nice John - congrats figuring out their culture :clap:


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## W. Beetus (May 23, 2012)

Wow! Great looking blooms!


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## SlipperFan (May 23, 2012)

Interesting. Almost makes me want to try them again...


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## Kevin (May 23, 2012)

TyroneGenade said:


> Fantastic growing! Thanks for the inspiration. I guess I will be killing some more Disa next Summer.



Is the climate that much different where you live from their native habitat? Don't they grow wild not far from you?


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## Tom499 (May 24, 2012)

Great looking plants!

I'm looking forward to mine flowering this year.


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## Paph_LdyMacBeth (May 24, 2012)

That's a great display John! I am glad to hear you are having success  sometimes the most enjoyable thing about growing orchids is the learning process (just ignore the 12,000 in losses) 

Sent from my BlackBerry 9300 using Tapatalk


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## Jaljala (May 24, 2012)

Very nice Disa, 
I am hopping to try these one day when I have room for them.
There is a producer in Britany, France who specializes in Disa. They made fabulous hydribs: http://pack.aspeco.net/lacanopee/1684/boutique/col314/les_disa314.htm


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## Erythrone (May 24, 2012)

Magnifique!!!!!!


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## newbud (May 24, 2012)

Any chance of seeing the setup you have to keep these beautiful plants alive?


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## cnycharles (May 25, 2012)

wally orchard in oregon, usa has disas, though this summer the greenhouse owner decided to round-up weeds and it killed many plants  . wally did tell me that he has many seed-based seedlings in the lab but it still hurts to lose prized plants. also asuka orchids in california, usa has disas as well as others that i don't remember off of the top of my head.


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## Ozpaph (May 25, 2012)

lovely flowers.
sound like the kind of orchids to grow when you've mastererd all the 'ungrowable' paph species.


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## monocotman (May 25, 2012)

For 'us' in maritime climates like the UK they seem to be fairly straight forward. I've managed to grow and flower them without any extra heat. 
Just sat in rainwater with the carnivorous plants with the odd feed. 
Lost them in the bad winter of 2010/11.
Check out 'Dave Parkinson plants' for a grower in the UK who only grows this genus. His displays at shows are amazing,
Regards,
David


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## biothanasis (May 25, 2012)

Fantastic flowers!!! Great growing tips!!! Thanks a million John. 

I read that these were difficult to grow, so I hesitated a lot to get a couple and try, but your growing advice really encouraged me into trying them... 

Thank again!!!!


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## Tom499 (May 25, 2012)

I have found Disa easy to grow, but that is mostly due to the advantage of where I live of course.

Keeping them cool in the UK is easy, and as long as they are brought in when it gets freezing they do just fine along with my CPs.


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## John M (May 25, 2012)

newbud said:


> Any chance of seeing the setup you have to keep these beautiful plants alive?


 I'll take a photo this weekend and post it here for you.


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## newbud (May 25, 2012)

Thanks John, I'm really curious.


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## John M (May 28, 2012)

newbud said:


> Thanks John, I'm really curious.



Here are a couple photos of my Disa growing area. It's VERY crude, low tech and NOT pretty; but, it has provided me with the best consistent results so far with Disas. I live in a very old farm house and the Disas are in the basement where it's about 60*F all the time, winter and summer. The plants are on an elevated bench that is 2' wide x 8' long. The entire thing is surrounded by sheets of heavy duty tinfoil that I can fold up and out of the way when I want to access the plants. There are four, 8', daylight fluorescent tubes lighting the plants, which are quite close to the bulbs. When all the tinfoil is down, containing the light and heat generated by the fixtures, it is very bright and about 10* warmer inside than it is in the rest of the room. I grow in a mix of 2 parts perlite and 1 part peatmoss, in clay pots and each one stands in it's own shallow tray of water. I use R.O. water with about 5% raw well water added back in to provide a little bit of minerals.












Here's another Disa Firebolt that has just come into bloom.






BTW: It was just pointed out to me that the pink ones look an aweful lot like Disa 'Rosy Face', othewsied known as Disa Unidiorosa 'Rosy Face'. So, I checked and it seems that my supplier originally made a type-o which I continued with. Those pinks are actually Unidiorosa 'Rosy Face', not "Smiley Face".


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## paphioboy (May 28, 2012)

Gorgeous! Great job, John...


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