Sick Cattleya

Spreadsheets for tracking blooms. I'm keeping a diary for all my chids in a spreadsheet so I can always check when what happened. Yes I also looked up the ancestry of all and put it in a spreadsheet and created a macro to calculate the percentages of each species in the hybrid. Yes I admit I am crazy and obsession, and proud of it.

I kind of like the sleuthing myself for noids even if I can't ever definitively say what it is. I still just call it what I think it most probably is.

I have a little booklet to keep track of things too - re-potting, blooming, new growth, etc. Helps me to know what I should be waiting on/trying to maximize.

That's really funny about your cat peeing into your ex's shoes!! I've never had a cat, but I've heard they can be quite animated!!

I think your phal will be fine - just take extra care not to bang it/move it/tip it anymore since it just fell - a little drop isn't the end of the world (imagine if kitty had decided to chew on it!) Its important to let the plant settle back into its pot though, so if you can, but it somewhere it won't get knocked over by a human or a feline :-)

I need some input again. -- and getting this post back on track.

My poor rootless Slc Mine Gold 'Corona' grew 3 new growths since losing all its roots in June... Yay! ... but they've slowed or nearly stopped growing since then. The older pbulbs are almost completely dessicated now and twisted and I still don't really have much in the way of roots. I think I counted 5, the longest is only about 3/4" long, and all extremely thin. It looks more like onc roots than the thicker roots that used to be on this plant!

I had the rhizome wrapped in a decent sized wad of spag and then had bark mix under about 1" of spag. I've been misting the leaves daily and wetting the spag after it totally dries. Picked things up to check on it a few days ago and found icky webb-type bug egg sacks all over the bark! ICK!!!

Between the nasty bugs, the thin roots and lack of speed on the growths (the longest of which is only about 1.5") I repotted. This time with much less spag, then a mix of about 70% di lecca and 30% bark mix... I've never used the di lecca before and I'm not sure if this will work or kill the plant for good. I've got it in a 4" clear slotted plastic pot with the bottom sitting in a catch tray filled with about 3/4" of water. So, somewhat semi-hydro. I did this because I'm afraid the spag was keeping things too moist resulting in thin roots or a rotting rhizome... also, I'm hoping the dilecca is not fun for bug nests. Still no clue what the bugs were, since all I found were eggs.

Does anyone think this is a bad idea? AM I probably going to end up killing this or is it maybe going into a semi-dormant stage due to declining light / seasonal changes? When it was healthy, I usually had blooms in Spring and Fall.

Thanks!!

I have made good experiences with my s/h rocks. And I have come to really distrust sphag-anything, since it tends to promote rot. So I really think you are going the right root here. I have my onc in only s/h rocks and I mist the new growths every morning, which they seem to like. All that misting would never be viable with sphag or bark mix since it would grow all sorts of things.

And go get a root-boosting fertilizer. Mine is made by COMPO and has done good work, no idea if it's available in the states. But I was looking for superthrive when I found it, so maybe try that.

I actually picked up some SuperThrive about 2 or 3 weeks ago and have been using that weekly. (Stinky stuff, too!)

I've been using about a drop per quart size container (yes, I water 1 quart at a time, 2 plants per quart approx). Do you think that's too weak? I worry about burning, especially on my ICU orchids.

Is there another root booster I could look for or maybe a natural remedy to try? I threw some Miracle Gro rooting hormone powder on the rhizome a month or two ago, but I don't know that it's done anything .... I almost wonder if the buggies could be responsible for the slow-down in the growth....