Repotting wet

Has anyone here repotted their cymbidiums a day after watering? ie. with wet roots.

I ask because last night, as I was bringing in the chids (after watering them in the morning) I discovered a slug on the phal and so decided to search the whole collection for stowaways. I discovered an infestation of some or another bug which had been eating away at my recovering cym Ming 'Pagoda'. So this morning I woke up at 4 and pulled it out of it's pot to look at the roots.

To my surprise, what looked like healthy (but didn't feel super healthy) roots just easily broke away. I removed nearly all of the medium and gave the roots a rinse and potted it in a smaller container with bark and a few blobs of sphag. After that I watered it in, and then watered it with a systemic pesticide that I have for mealybug (from my understanding, an organophosphate should be able to kill anything that is small and can breath)

What I would like to know is did I just managed to mangle up a perfectly healthy root system because I was paranoid?

Thanks.

Praveer

Ps. just a reminder that it's winter here.

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I think it should fine, Praveer, as long as it did not get colder than usual. Many orchids actually do better after being repotted. And getting rid of any bugs and slugs is a must to keep your collection healthy. I think you should not worry, but I suppose time will answer your question better than I can. For what it is worth - I think I would have done the same thing.

Cheers,
BD

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We could learn a lot from crayons: some are sharp, some are pretty, some are dull, some have weird names, and all are different colors....but they all exist very nicely in the same box. ...Hmmm? .

Same here bugs have to go , Only thing is if I use a systemic I wait until the roots are pretty dry so they soak it up . gin

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With cymbidiums for me, the roots WILL get wet during repotting anyway.
I blast the roots with the garden hose to remove all the old potting media (I make sure the water is not freezing cold or hot).
With the cymbidium root system - specially for large ones - this is the only way I can clean up the roots to perform a proper inspection.

I get a couple of roots like that with cymbidiums every now and then.
Did the roots look fat and white but the surface was porous/spongy instead of the shiny/smooth exterior?
I call them "sponge roots", I dont know what exactly causes it but the roots appear to have died some time ago but did not rot. What is left is a spongy husk of the velamen that breaks off rather easily.

That's exactly what they looked and felt like. What concerns me now though is that I couldn't feel any proper healthy roots, the ones that are plump and firm. And to make matters worse I just knocked the plant over when I went to mist it this morning. Hopefullly, it didn't do to much damage because the plant moved only slightly and only media went flying out.

Thanks so much for the advice. Makes me feel so much better that I did what is construed as the right thing.

Praveer

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