Aspirin

[orchidsarefun]

Originally Posted by catherinecarney

There are many, many different phytochemicals in various plants that have antibacterial/antifungal/antiviral properties. The salicylic acid in willow is just the best known (though it's mostly known as an NSAID and rooting stimulent).
Catherine

Agreed, and its also feasible that fungi play a role in making these chemicals available to plants/orchids, whether they are in the soil ( as per this article ) or on tree trunks/orchid roots.

Fungi-filled forests are critical for endangered orchids -- ScienceDaily

[catherinecarney]

Oh, thank you for the fungi reminder--I'd forgotten about them! Now I can't help but wonder about the lack of fungi and its impact on flask raised orchids....Though given that fungi spores are pretty much floating around in the atmosphere that may not be a major issue....

It seems like what it boils down to is that there's a lot we don't know, simply because A) in situ sampling of conditions hasn't occurred and we're working from assumptions (happens with wild caught aquarium fish all of the time, too) and B) we have anecdotal evidence, but good hard empirical evidence is lacking.

I run into this all the time with killifish and goodeids--the temp info we get on them is based on the air temps, but a lot of their collection locales are from shaded streams, which are donsiderably (10 F) cooler than the air temps....And we wonder why they don't do well until we actually get biotope pictures....Same goes for orchids--I always try to get a look at an in situ pic for the species (or parents of the hybrids) if I can....It may not work for everyone, but once I started looking at where my plants came from I started being able to grow them a lot better....

I'll have to experiment with willow and oak barks in the spring (and osage orange, which is also a dyestuff, but don't remember if it's quercetin based)--not just for the SA and quercetin values, but also for the tannins...So many things to try and so little time, lol....

Catherine

[orchidsarefun]

I think its good advice for people to have more "inquiring minds". With orchids, more so.
I discovered by accident ( I needed more space ) that my miltoniopsis seedlings grow much better in cooler temps, despite the fact that the 75% parent supposedly prefers warm conditions. I even conducted an experiment by leaving 2 in warmer conditions and these 2 gradually withered away. I have other examples too.

[catherinecarney]

Too many people close their minds to possibilities because "it hasn't been done before" or whatever, and with things like orchids where we don't always have good, reliable information that can be a problem. We need to be willing to experiment with our plants and find what works best given our individual growing conditions (hence your miltoniopsis seedling experience).

Perhaps just as importantly, we need to document what we do and publicize it so others can have the benefit of the shared experience when tailoring their cultural practices to their plants and growing conditions--which is why we need threads like this on Orchid Board!

BTW, rose growers use aspirin in the water when attempting to root rose cuttings, so I wonder if some of the benefits we're seeing in our orchids is due to the enhanced root growth? For those who have used aspirin, how do the roots on your plants look?

[Fairorchids]

[QUOTE=

BTW, rose growers use aspirin in the water when attempting to root rose cuttings, so I wonder if some of the benefits we're seeing in our orchids is due to the enhanced root growth? For those who have used aspirin, how do the roots on your plants look?[/QUOTE]

Nah, I just use regular rooting hormone powder, and I root abt 90%

[palm521]

Originally Posted by jeremyinsf

Viagra makes flowers stand up straight and last longer. But I'm not about to tell my doctor that my plants need a prescription. I think I'll stick with Ray's comment here and just try to treat my plants well in general.

Viagra makes flowers stand up straight

now this is epic and funny!

beware :

is any husband with an orchid loving wife missing any pills lately ?.

just sayin!

sorry for the offtopic.

[NYCorchidman]

That is a good hypothesis to test and study to find out for sure.

It could just also be that the surface of certain trees relates better with certain orchids' roots, or there are other microorganisms (or larger living things) living on certain trees or other complex relationships and interactions involved like the locations certain trees are found that happened to be also favorable for certain orchids for example.

[gravotrope]

Some tree bark contains chemicals that inhibit the growth of microbes, I'm thinking of the ficus and bucida genera, generally. Some fungi can attack cellulose fibers and destroy plant tissue, so it would make sense that millions of years later some trees have a natural defense mechanism to prevent such situations.

I use aspirin on plants that I know are sick and need a little help and it works for me, but if a plant is fine, then I don't treat it. Sometimes cutting leaves is recommended, but if the plant doesn't really have too many leaves, then cutting would stress it out too much. I have some vandas with the purple spot fungus that I treat with aspirin and it helps, these plants have grown in root volume and haven't been taken down by fungal infection. Repeatedly using aspirin would not be a good thing, but once a month to help the plant control infections is good, unless the plant is in spike. I do not use aspirin on plants that have gone past the first few weeks of spiking, since aspirin stops the growth for weeks (a Colmanara) and although I have never had a bloom spike die from it, it has delayed a bloom for over a month (I was using it every week, and had to stop using it to get the spike to bloom.) Bread mold is hard to get rid of, it even creates thermospores to stick around past a pasteurization, but using aspirin and neem on a Howeara as well as removing the old bulbs that were too far gone has helped me to revive it from certain death. The basal leaves have a couple yellow spots but the pseudobulb and top leaf are fine, and the new keiki is looking healthy with no root issues.

It has also stopped crown rot in a Phalaenopsis that would have been doomed otherwise because it triggers a response from inside the plant, not just treating the surface. And I bought an Angraecum sesquipedale in need of help that is doing much better now; I think the aspirin helped it survive being repotted to a basket when it has a fungal infection and it was basically top heavy in a small plastic pot and kept falling over, doing more damage, it started growing new roots two weeks ago, about two weeks after being repotted. I grow outdoors mostly, and when you have microbes that are already inside the plant tissue, it is much harder to stop the degradation and stress that the plant undergoes.

That is my experience with aspirin. Now when I use it I add a drop of superthrive and liquid seaweed at half strength to offset a general slowdown in the growth. It's been just over a year for the Howeara and it is just 1 bulb and a young keiki, but it is healthy.

[orchidsarefun]

so I've been using aspirin for a while.
1-2 uncoated aspirin in a 2g watering can, roughly 1x per week. I use this for a basic mix with neem, rubbing alcohol and Dr Bronner's as a preventive spray, as well as watering.

I can't see that this regime has had any negative impacts.

First photo is a Phal Yaphon Lobspis that has developed a bud as well as a new spike. So, under my conditions, aspirin use has had no impact on spike development.
Second photo is of 2 violacea grexes that almost died from mites, infections, rot. I think once a plant is infected, then its downhill from there. I used aspirin on these, as with all other plants and seedlings, and you can see that they have recovered very well. I didn't remove any of the "bad" leaves, or rotted areas.

I, for one, am convinced that aspirin is a GOOD thing !!

[NYCorchidman]

I don't see how aspirin helped the plant with mite infestation, or did you mean you used your mixture of aspirin and other stuff (neem and alcohol) which might have killed them or washed them off??