Sharry baby poor blooming - how to prevent?

[Phyrex]

This sharry baby finished blooming mid November 2008 and started spiking again around christmas. Now all flowers have opened but there are only 3 and it doesn't appear that the other nodes on the spike are doing anything. When I first got the plant the spike that it had at that point only had 3-4 flowers (semi-wilted) but this was on a mature p-bulb. This spike has now formed on a relatively young p-bulb. Is there any way of preventing such a poor blooming on a young p-bulb and save up it's energy when it's ready to "perform"? I'm worried that the recent trend of having one good spike and then one poor one will continue. It's in a 5" S/H pot and has 5 mature p-bulbs, 1 young one, and 1 new growth.

[smwboxer]

Looks like your Sherry is either over or under watered. I'd check the roots to see if they are OK.

[orchid-man]

to me it looks like there has not been enough water,fertilizer maybe warmth and I am unable to tell about the light.I find that these plants Love the warmth and the high 70's to the high 80's is about their ideal growing and flowering temps for the day and going down to about 65 at night.With these nice temps keep the humidity high,and I mean high - 80 - 90 % during most of the time.
Feeding they are a hungry plant,feed very well,I'm using a 20-15-15 with added nitrogen and magnesium twice a week at full strenght.The light levels for Sharry Baby is rather low for Oncidiums about 8000 - 10000 lux.

[Ron-NY]

Due to the accordioning of the leaves I was thinking irregular watering might be the problem but you do have it in S/H. So humidity may be the issue with that.

[Hillbilly Bob]

Ron some of mine that are in sh like a mist a couple times a day I time it at 10 Am 2 Pm for about 1 min 2 pm gives them time to dry out by night seemed to improve the bloom time. My sent of a woman tried to bloom and was struggling thats when I played with misting worked not the total answer but some of it.

[Orchidzrule]

I can see a few roots and with s/h it shouldn't be suffering from uneven watering, so I agree low humidity is the most likely culprit for the accordioning of the leaves. Richard, was the plant like this when you got it, or did the leaf pleating occur under your care? If the former, the plant may improve. And, once the plant is growing well, it should produce stronger spikes. If the latter, I'd try increasing the humidity. (Yeah, I know that can be a lot easier said than done!)

From what I can see, the color of the leaves look good--better than on my Sharry Baby, which has some of the spotting that Sharry Baby is so prone to.

Cheers,
Rob

[orchid-man]

From what I can see, the color of the leaves look good--better than on my Sharry Baby, which has some of the spotting that Sharry Baby is so prone to.

Cheers,
Rob

that spotting is caused by a combination of to much light and low humidity

[Becky15349]

I agree with the above, your sharry is under lack of water and humidity stress and needs more of both. Ever considered water culture? My sharry baby loves it!!
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[Phyrex]

I can see the humidity issues as it has been 30% for most of Dec, Jan, and Feb but it's now at 50% and should stay at least that for the rest of the year. Is it still possible to under water with S/H. Could it also be that the water has been a bit too cold over the winter? I am particularly surprised that it blooms on such a young p-bulb when I think it shouldn't yet. In addition I didn't fertilize for a couple of months so that might be the issue too.

The pleated leaves are because of the p-bulb being very young still. I hope (assume) they will stretch out when it matures a bit more.

[Ron-NY]

The pleated leaves are because of the p-bulb being very young still. I hope (assume) they will stretch out when it matures a bit more.

Usually not