Sickly Zygopetalum with significant problems.

[BrassavolaStars]

Hello All,

I am concerned about a particular Zygopetalum in my collection that is not thriving. I have never killed a Zygo and out of my 10 Zygos, some of which I have had for three years, this one is not doing so well. It is an advance Australia “HOF”.

When I bought it in July, it was already sort of a weak plant with most of the roots desiccated (although all the roots look dead in the photo, there are some good, healthy ones not pictured). Now, I am seeing that some of the leaves are yellowing. This does not seem to be uncommon with zygos as in my experience (though this may wrong), they are semi-deciduous and the leaves on the old bulbs fall off eventually.

What concerns me is that I see no evidence of a new growth starting anytime soon. I am worried I will be left with three leafless bulbs and no new growth with leaves and that the plant will eventually die.

Does anyone have any suggestions? I was wondering if it would be a good idea to trim away the aforementioned dead roots and repot it in fresh moss.

It also has some spots under the leaves. I think they may have been there when I bought it. I also have those same spots under the leaves on my Coelogynes. I think it may be Cercospora (or something similar), but I spray my plants often with cleary’s (which allegedly is a systemic that kills fungal leaf spot) so it doesn’t spread.