J
Jimsox
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what the hell did you all just say?
Fertilizer and some problems...
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Exactly, that's what I explain when I give my lecture on the orchids fertilization. A producer or an hobbyist must make flowering absolutely the plant that he grows otherwise it is money and time lost. That's why we try fertilize our plants regularly with a quantity of nutrients (NPK+ oligos + vitamins + ....) optimized for each genus and varieties.
On the photos of orchids taken in nature we do not usually see many flowers or masses of flowering plants because nutrients are not always available throughout the year in quantity and quality.
Nature is only a so so grower.
She does very well with her annuals but when it comes to perrinials her collection suffers a lot. :rollhappy:
In the natural environment plants rarely receive the constant supply of nutrients needed to replicate what you can give your captive plants. By fertilizing your plants at the optimum levels you can improve on natures normal growth. At least you can make your plants look better if you like plump flawless foliage and lots of blooms as opposed to yellow chewed up foliage and flowers.
Nor do you usually see photos of what the majority of wild orchids look like. People, myself included tend to seek the best looking subjects to photograph.
I remember one trip I made through the cloud forest with the intent to photograph orchids in their natural environment. That whole week I never took a single picture because it was a dry spell and everything looked ugly, dried and crispy. There was not a single plant among the millions that would be considered healthy and well grown in a growers collection. They all needed water and fertilizer. In hind sight I should have taken pictures so I could show them to illustrate this example.
Except a couple of species, like Phalaenopsis gigantea or Paphiopedilum sanderianum, whose nearly all the plants could get a CCM instant in the wild, it's true that many plants are not growing that nicely in the wild.
About the rain, it releases ammonia with the thunderstorm, and the rates can be pretty high. Analysis of rain water can reveal quite a few surprising things, most ions have been found in rain water depending on the season, the wind...
I made the initial post to explain why we cannot make anything 'absolute' and 'definitive'. There is always a part about the parameter that no one though about, or the chemistry that few people knows. It's true that I grow in tropical countries, but most fertilizers are anyway hygroscopic, it's extremely rare to have a fertilizer with less than 10-15% of relative humidity even in Europe, some compounds are hygroscopic, like calcium nitrate, and last, some have hydratation molecules. So basically, when we read and think that we apply exactly what's on the box, it is nearly never the case.
As for the wild plants, they get amino acids and some special types of things - biotin for paphs is synthetized by some algae as an example... which helps them to bypass a more complex processus of manufacture, that needs as a started mineral ions. I am not sure too that paphs cannot be considered as a bit saprophytic, at least in the wild and for some species, in the way they handle the nutrients....
About the rain, it releases ammonia with the thunderstorm, and the rates can be pretty high. Analysis of rain water can reveal quite a few surprising things, most ions have been found in rain water depending on the season, the wind...
I made the initial post to explain why we cannot make anything 'absolute' and 'definitive'. There is always a part about the parameter that no one though about, or the chemistry that few people knows. It's true that I grow in tropical countries, but most fertilizers are anyway hygroscopic, it's extremely rare to have a fertilizer with less than 10-15% of relative humidity even in Europe, some compounds are hygroscopic, like calcium nitrate, and last, some have hydratation molecules. So basically, when we read and think that we apply exactly what's on the box, it is nearly never the case.
As for the wild plants, they get amino acids and some special types of things - biotin for paphs is synthetized by some algae as an example... which helps them to bypass a more complex processus of manufacture, that needs as a started mineral ions. I am not sure too that paphs cannot be considered as a bit saprophytic, at least in the wild and for some species, in the way they handle the nutrients....
I thing it's a minimum / maximum problem
A member of our orchidsociety here in German has watering his orchids 12 month only with rainwater (following nature) - after this time he break off the attempt - plants are in bad condition
Rene Klinge from Netherlands proved, that many Paphs.species seedlings (not all) can very fast growing under this condition:
28 ° C, hight supplementary light, hight fertilizier
..and then, this optimal cultivate plants are comming in our hobby greenhouse:
outside temperature today in Germany - 6° C
greenhouse temperature : day 18°C night 15°C
what high of fertilizier we have to use for a good grow?
In the last years we get many improvements for plant growing with Vitamins, amino acid, humin acid and other aids - following nature.
I get the information from an expert, that all plants have a saprothytic or mykorrhiza also orchids, in order to survive in nature.
To the importantly function of micro elements "sanderianum" already referred in a another thread.
A member of our orchidsociety here in German has watering his orchids 12 month only with rainwater (following nature) - after this time he break off the attempt - plants are in bad condition
Rene Klinge from Netherlands proved, that many Paphs.species seedlings (not all) can very fast growing under this condition:
28 ° C, hight supplementary light, hight fertilizier
..and then, this optimal cultivate plants are comming in our hobby greenhouse:
outside temperature today in Germany - 6° C
greenhouse temperature : day 18°C night 15°C
what high of fertilizier we have to use for a good grow?
In the last years we get many improvements for plant growing with Vitamins, amino acid, humin acid and other aids - following nature.
I get the information from an expert, that all plants have a saprothytic or mykorrhiza also orchids, in order to survive in nature.
To the importantly function of micro elements "sanderianum" already referred in a another thread.
