I cooked my Vanila Orchid

[lordkiwi]

Originally Posted by Swimmingorchids

I use rain water.
Does anyone want to do a side by side comparrison of rain water vs boiled dehumidifer water vs distilledd water ?

Yall this is very fun, but does anyone want to look at my pictures and tell me if there is any way to save it?

PS: any water can be sterilized but not all sterilized water is distilled.

What does your rain water smell like?

[Ray]

It doesn't look as bad as I expected. I'd lay the entire thing down on the top of the moss -not "into" the moss - and expect that you'll see more roots penetrating it shortly.

[lordkiwi]

Originally Posted by Ray

It doesn't look as bad as I expected. I'd lay the entire thing down on the top of the moss -not "into" the moss - and expect that you'll see more roots penetrating it shortly.

How does this look?

[Roberta]

Originally Posted by lordkiwi

Yall this is very fun, but does anyone want to look at my pictures and tell me if there is any way to save it?

PS: any water can be sterilized but not all sterilized water is distilled.

What does your rain water smell like?

Since when do orchids need sterile water? In nature, they get rain water mixed with detritus from rotting stuff above them, possibly "seasoned" with a few bird or animal droppings. Hardly sterile. In fact, that's their "fertilizer".

[camille1585]

Originally Posted by Swimmingorchids

sry to hear.

Ps: I know water out the dehumidifier is water extracted from the air but it's not the same process as distillation.

I don't think it is safe to drink or to give to pets so I wouldn't give it to orchids either. Too late now but why use dehumidifier water.

There certainly eint any orchids out there thinking after a nice rain fall - hmm bit rainy, need to find myself a good dehumidifier bar

distilled water is sterilized. Dehumidifier water is water sucked from all the mouldy bits in your home and contains bacteria and biological contaminants (mould). It can also contain traces of heavy metals

There was actually a whole thread on this topic 1-2 years back, from someone in Florida I believe who had several dehumidifiers which generated a lot of water. The conclusions from that discussion was that it's perfectly safe for orchids.

[Ray]

Originally Posted by lordkiwi

How does this look?

I'd remove any sphagnum that is over the vine, and probably put a piece of plastic wrap over the top, trapping humidity, but not sealing it in. Place it in bright, indirect light and keep it very warm.

[Leafmite]

Ray has good advice. These are usually rooted from cuttings so you should be fine. My Vanilla puts out roots from every node (to anchor to that imaginary tree that it should be climbing). Good luck!

I order quite a few plants from Logees (for myself, as gifts, etc.). I love all the fun plants!

I know quite a few people who have used the water from the dehumidifier for many, many years without any issues. Where I live, everyone has water softeners so if one has plants, the choices are either buying water, collecting rain water, or making use of the water collected by the dehumidifier. Because the water is without any nutrients, I would advise making certain that your fertilizing program includes Calcium.

[Orchid Whisperer]

Originally Posted by lordkiwi

Images

It looks like that could recover. Maybe. Get rid of dead plant tissues (leaves stems roots). Pot normally, keep in the shade. Some of that cooking appears to be sunburn, even recovered, orchids often require some protection from the sun, i.e., shade cloth.

[lordkiwi]

So an update. My plant had two branches and one died. The second branch appears to have stopped dyeing. One of the two air roots has dried up but next to it appears to be the bud of a new root. I am going to put some plastic wrap over the bowl and set it back in the window.

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by lordkiwi

So an update. My plant had two branches and one died. The second branch appears to have stopped dyeing. One of the two air roots has dried up but next to it appears to be the bud of a new root. I am going to put some plastic wrap over the bowl and set it back in the window.

The colour of the spaghnum doesn't look fantastic ----- brown and darkish etc. Maybe too wet, and not doing too well.

Maybe you can just put it is very light amount of spaghnum instead. I have a few small plants, and I just spray a bit of water each morning (with a sprayer want) just to keep the lightly packed spaghnum a little moist only. The water just gets distributed by the spaghnum.

I don't have to grow my vanilla orchids in this particular way. That's just how I started off, and just kept it up. It helps to have something that they can climb around, as their roots like to cling to surfaces. I just didn't want them to cling to the nearby bricks, as their roots will leave marks or stains on the bricks hahaha.

The orchids are in the same flexible plastic tubs that they came in (through the post), with good drainage holes at the bottom. The pots that they sit in are only to make sure that the drainage holes in the flexible pot remain blocked. I will eventually just repot these orchids in the regular pot style.

In my part of the world, I don't think I even need to use spaghnum at all. I'm predicting that the orchid could just be potted in volcanic rock/scoria, and it would still do just fine. Maybe a different story for drier parts of the world though.