Masd Orange Delight

[jtlqh]

This one started to spike since last Oct, but somehow the spikes kept aborting. In despair, I put the it next to my office's north window and started to watered everyday, dada, I got 13 buds now.

Qing

[Brutal_Dreamer]

Beautiful! Looks like it is really happy in its new location.

Cheers,
BD

[Piper]

They really enjoy a lot of moisture! Great color and nice a closeup, Qing!

How are all your Neos doing?

McJulie

[Tindomul1of9]

Very cool Qing! The orange is spectacular. ANd they say Masdies don't like change.

[smartie2000]

Wow that orange is excellent and many blooms too. Floribunda influence?

How wet do they need to be? My plants has never started drying yet in the humid aquarium set up and I'm scared of root rot. They are potted in sphag except for my infracta, which I may move to sphag too if they need to be really wet. Are they like phrags when it comes to wetness?

[jtlqh]

Fran, when I got them, they were in a mix of tree fern, perlite and chopped spagh. I unpotted them 2 months ago and found a lot of root rot so I repotted them in fresh mix of the same stuff (yes, I made same mix), but made them very loose so air can get to the roots. I water the ones in my home daily since my apartment is warmer, but every other day in my office. I had a fan in each of the fishtank where I grow the masds. The top mix gets dry in 2 days if it is next to the fan, and 3 days if it is farther. From the material I read, masd's root should not be allowed to dry and if the root has air through it, it can stand daily watering. Here is a link for masd culture MASDEVALLIA


The north windowsill in my office gets really cold, 70F/day and 50-55F/night(heating got turn off at night, which is good for my cool grower, but bad for my phals and I put a heating mat underneath the phals). My masd Pround Mary was doing so bad in my apartment, it lost half of its leaves. But since I moved it to my office, it grew 3 new leaves and 3 spikes with 3 huge buds.

Qing

[Piper]

Mine are either in an open basket with sphag, or mounted with sphag in my terrarium, which I keep 60-80% humidity. I water them every other day, and they're happy. Most of mine are more warmth tolerant. My Drac is putting up a new growth, which amazes me! But I can't get any of the spikes to bloom. It really wants to be watered 2x day, and I just don't get to it.

McJulie

[smartie2000]

Wow 2x a day in sphag! I dont even give my phrags that

The entire bottom of my aquarium is wet low quality sphag for humidity and decor and the plants are in NZ sphag. All of them have been tolerant except for one that lost 3 leaves although it is opening 3 buds for me inaddition my the other bloom. My blooms are lighter colour than the show ones but that may be a temperature thing (or they darken with age?). The leaf loss can be due to orchid show displaying stress rather than heat. I have 3 ice packs to keep the bottom cool. The stupid lights warm up the vivarium.

If heat ever become a issue, especially in the summer I might as well get like a used 70 gallon tank with shop lights and put it into my cool storage room room in the basement and get cool growing milts and stuff. Unfortunately its a storage room... I would give plants winter rest in there too

I must unpot one to check out the roots! and I'm gonna put the infracta (probably my most tolerant one) in sphag now to keep watering the same for all plants. What the heck I'll repot them all. The moss already has algae growing on them

[Piper]

It's winter now, so heat hasn't been a problem, but I'm thinking as things warm I might swap one of my ice paks into the terarrium to keep the Drac cool. You know, the solid packs for frozen blue stuff you use in your cooler in the summer...

Draculas like cool and moist. I need to throw some more moss over the mount that would help on the watering issue.

McJulie

[jtlqh]

I did this on my masds in the office before I moved the tank to the north windowsill. I filled plastic cups with water and put them in the freezer. Once they turned into ice, I placed one cup in the tank which cooled it 2-3F lower. But the ice would melt in 4 hours.

I think you can use your fogger to cool the tank. You can use a 5 gallon water bucket fill with water, then make a floater for the fogger so it will be at the optimal level to put out fog. Cut a hole on the cover of the water tank to mount a PC fan, then attach a PCV tube to the fan and the other end going into the vavarium from the top. I saw some setups which are very cool.

I am buying another glass tank to make my dream vavaium.

Qing