My Rescue Phal
Hello
I found this forum when i was searching for what to do with an orchid I "rescued" from the local garden centre. It was on the clearance shelf as it had finished flowering. All I know is it's a yellow Phal.
My other Phal, again cheap ones from the supermarkets, seem to have much better roots, so i did some reading and decided to report the rescue one. I'm hoping this was the right thing to do! Im posting here to hopefully find out what else to do.
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There is just a yellow blotch on one leaf, the brown bit on the end of that leaf is just shadows.
When i pulled the plant out the pot and removed all the bark, there are certainly some root issues. A few places are soggy. A few places are black, but not fluffy like bad sooty mould. I have more photos, but understand its 4 photos max at a time. Some roots had almost snapped and where still held together by a tiny dead strand of tissue. However, there are some that dont look too bad to my inexperienced eyes, and a new root stub.
I cut off the obviously wet roots, and the very dead ones, and repotted it in a smaller pot. I also cut out the little plastic basket around the base of the plant. Wherever type of olant it is, i never seem to get on with those root cages or biodegrabable pots! The local garden centre is small and has limited supplies, so i used a rigid, clear plastic pot that might have been a hummus or olive pot. I cut lots of drainage holes in the bottom, and on the side right low down, as my other pots have drainage holes right low down too. I used orchid compost/bark.
It's now on a sw facing windowsill, just in the plastic pot, with a slightly larger clear plastic pot instead of a pretty one to catch any last drops of water.
I have been giving them a soaking every week or less, and then letting them drain in the sink before putting them back in pretty pots on the window sill or on my furniture.
Any advice on what to do better will be very gratefully received
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thank you. Some of my friends think orchids are really hard to grow, and i have more experience in food crops. You cant get away with chopping roots off spuds or parsnips, so it's a little worrying at first to re-learn a slightly different rule book. I'm glad to hear its not gone too horribly wrong.....yet