White Fuzz

[catmos46]

Hey I was looking for some advice online about orchids and I stumbled across this forum. I tried searching and looked through a lot of the commonly listed problems but haven't seen anything exactly like what I'm looking for.

Anyway here's the scoop. Over the summer I gave my girlfriend a cattleya mossiae for her birthday. Soon after I got it I repotted it and it was doing well up till now. Recently she has noticed some white fuzzy stuff near the bulbs. Neither of us are sure what it is, the book I she has doesn't seem to cover it. Searching on here I've found a few pictures of snow mold and it kind of looks like it but I'd like a to double check
Here are a couple of pictures

And one more


Does anyone know what this could be and how should it be treated? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Brutal_Dreamer]

That looks more like a type of scale than mold. You should unpot this orchid and using a toothbrush or high pressure spray, remove all of this white stuff. Be sure to peal away any dry 'skin-like' coverings to make sure you have removed all of the scale. Next, spray the entire plant, covering every surface with a poison (Avid, Talstar, or Malathion: a few good ones). Repot the orchid in new mix and spray again (with out unpotting this time) once a week for three weeks -- (remember to cover all surfaces of the plant) even if you do not see any more white stuff. After three weeks, if you see no more scale, then your orchid is free to move back into your growing area with your other plants.

Best of luck.

Cheers,
BD

[Becky15349]

Good luck with the scale - you found the right forum to get help! Seems like lots of people get scale...I haven't had it happen to me yet (knocking on my wooden desk...)

[catmos46]

Thanks for the replies and suggestions. We picked up some malathion _ and will try that course of treatment. Will malathion hurt the orchid since it's a poison? This is her 1st orchid so between us we know almost nothing about how to treat them. I really hope it survives, it would be a shame for the plant to die before it even blooms.

[JoeW]

Catmos, for more information, go to
Insect and Arthropod Pest Identi
and scroll down to mealybugs. You can save the orchid by being careful to destroy the the very tiny crawlers hatching from eggs. That is why Bruce recommends the three week treaatment. Female mealybugs cannot fly, so keep the infected plant from touching other plants.