Rhy. Gigantea potting/setup help

[Fairorchids]

Rhy gigantea can be temperamental. Prior to my 2017 freeze, I had some 20-25 of them. Currently I have about 10.

1. It needs light similar to Cattleya, or perhaps slightly brighter. I have grown them in full sun, but feel that they do better with slight shade. Currently I have then hanging below my Vandas, which are growing in full sun.

2. During the winter season, I do let them dry out between waterings. Right now (in high light), they get the Vanda treatment via a sprinkler with electronic timer = sprinkler on 20 minutes every 6 hours.

3. This plant reacts negatively to having it's roots disturbed. For many years I had them in Vanda baskets, loosely filled with a spaghnum/bark mix (4:1). However, when repotting every 2-3 years, some of the plants would stop growing for 6-12 months.

Now I have most of them in Vanda baskets filled with Aliflor (LECA) nuggets; thus I water a bit more (in winter twice a week, spring/fall 3 times a week, and summer as explained above). Most of the plants have taken to this, and I plan (hope) to never having to repot those plants again.

[farley101]

Thanks for the input Kim. My other vanda is in a setup sort of like you describe. Not a basket, a regular 4" square plastic pot filled with leca. It has exploded with growth the last few weeks, new roots and roots branching off of roots I thought were dead.

I will add this to the list of possible "fixes". Seems like a good way to go to avoid having to mess with the roots and set back the plant.

[technical_support]

Saw this subject and made an account to post this.

I have had one of these for about 4 years. Slow grower, but it does better with phal lighting(1000fc or 90%shade) and photo-period than vanda light (4000fc or 60% shade) one would think. When I started growing it under LED lights I thought this was going to be they key to getting cascades of those amazing blooms. Nope. Over the course of two months the plant actually turned all its leaves down and away from my LEDs. And I was only at about 2500fc. I dropped the light intensity to 1000fc(90% shade value) and after several months the leaves returned to their proper upward orientation.

For the first two years for sheer amusement(and to watch the roots grow) I grew it in in a clear plastic pot and packaging peanuts to slow the evaporation. Watered it twice a week. It bloomed like this.

Now it still has 50% packaging peanuts in the pot and a top dressing of power plus orchiata. It bloomed like this to.

To much light and it just kinda goes into shock and sits there. Once its happy it sends out roots the size of your thumb. Winter bloomer.

I hope yours is growing well at this point!

[farley101]

I appreciate the reply! I have not had a chance to fix my set up yet. I did find out the hard way about the light levels when the leaves I had out in the sun started pitting and not looking great.

I moved it back into my shelving unit where it gets sun briefly in the morning, but then pretty well shaded after that. I've seen some root growth since then so I think I'm on the right track.

Still planning on moving to a pot with chunky medium, hopefully when I get home from my latest trip I can get it taken care of.