new to cattleyas - please advise

[chemist]

I purchased these as seller stated near to blooming size cattleyas :
1. Slc. Vallezac 'Evelyn'
2. Pot. Susan Fender 'Cover Girl'
3. Blc. Chia Lin 'Shinsu' AM/AOS, AM/JOGA



Any comments as how healthy these plants are? As i stated in the title I'm new to cattleya, and these guys are my first ones. Seller stated they were repotted recently... so on one plant roots are not in great shape but looks like have new secondary root grows. Leaves are very plum (very hard, feels like artificial plastic). Pseudo bulbs on most are little bit shriveled (Is it should be like that?), maybe from sitting one extra day in transit.

what will grow from here?


Any advises are welcome

[78Terp]

Nothing will grow from that naked pb. As I understand it, catts only grow roots on new, growing pbs. So that is why one really has to wait till active root growth is happening to re-pot. I killed 2 by re-potting at the wrong time.

That is about all I can state about catts except to let them dry completely between waterings and lots of light.

[chemist]

Harvey,
there are other PBs with leaves and same thing in the base of the leave.
Am I understand correct - one PB = one leave? and new grows appears as new PB?

[78Terp]

Some catts can have 2 leaves on a pb but yes. And only new growths/pbs will flower.

[catttan]

They look very healthy to me. The pb in the 3rd picture are buried a bit too deep in the medium ; all 3 cattelyas are very good choices.

[ksriramkumar]

concur with Harvey. there are two types of catts. one is unifoliate (single leaf on top of pseudobulb) or bifoliate (two leaves on top of pseudobulb). All three look very healthy. agree with yew sung, keep the base pseudobulb on top of medium and don't bury it. it could be prone to rot

[Carolla]

To add to it, the back bulbs (the leafless ones) are storage for the plant and may pop a new bulb at their base. If you have a large plant and can divide so that each side has several pbulbs, the back bulbs can start a new plant.

[citywildcat]

78Terp, you're exactly right about the double-leaved Catts. I think they're called "bifoliates", even more common among multi generic hybrids, like Potinara (a 4 genus hybrid).

---------- Post Merged at 05:34 AM ----------

ksriramkumar, MY BAD! I failed to read your post and mine is redundant..... sorry!

[Catt Mandu]

I grow more Cattleya alliance than anything else. Some of my Cattleyas I have owned nearly 30 years.

The plants you have look healthy. Unless these are compact hybrids, I would not think that they are near blooming size. IMO they likely have 2 years to go. My experience is that Cattleyas bloom best when they have at least 4 pseudobulbs with leaves that are at mature size (mature size is determined by plant genetics) and good roots.

To get good roots, Cattleyas need a well-drained medium and must dry between watering events. I use:

Whole wine corks (my favorite), or

Very coarse bark mixed with equal parts of material that won't rot - coarse charcoal or "Styrofoam packing peanuts", or

Inorganic material that will not rot, such as "lava rock".

I always use clay pots, never plastic (unless they are net pots)

Strong light is best for flowering, let plants adjust to strong light gradually.
Posted via Mobile Device

[chemist]

Thank you all for your replies!

Since these plants came already potted I'll wait to repot them until you guys will suggest to do so, because as Harvey said one has to wait until active root grows which I don't see on mine yet. I contact seller about one plant with roots not in great shape so she said plant had new root growth (I think she was referring to secondary ones). I'm aware that only new PBs grow roots and than those roots can grow secondary roots. Probably it was growing when they repotted it in GH.

So if I don't see really new root growths I have to wait for repotting? And also it was stated that since it was repotted not so long ago this pot will last at least a year, if not two. All of them are potted in orchiata bark.

Catt Mandu, seller in ad stated Evelyn is standard cattleya, Cover girl - more to the compact one, shinsu - only says its classic cattleya. I'm not expecting them to bloom as you said in few years. I bought this size to try if I can give them culture they need and if they won't like new home and dye the cost would not be that high as for mature plants. Unfortunately I don't have any nurseries around me which sells orchids to pick mature plants I like and those big stores only sell phals. There is one orchid nursery few hours away but they sell only wholesale which is not an option in my case.
I might join orchid community in county I live but from their website I don't see they are very active over there.

Is east window exposure enough for cattleya? I would say direct sun there from 8am till maybe 11am, the church building block the sun before 8 am and after 11 sun is blocked by the roof of my house. In winter time or when all leaves from tree on west side will fall I can move them to the west windowsill so they can get more sun. Or in worth scenario I will have to buy lights.
Harvey, any suggestion on lights topic?!