Advice on Fertilizing?

[orchidlauren]

Hi, beginner here! Lots of questions on this, but I've gotten a few new orchids and just want to know if I'm doing things right. At the moment i got 5 pals and 1 new Miltonia 'Sunset'.
At the moment I use Miracle Gro Water-Soluble Orchid Food on my pals along with Miracle Gro Coarseblend Orchid Potting Mix. Food Ratio: 1/4tsp: 1 gal.
1. The food suggests using it every 2 weeks but in my opinion that seems persistent in fertilizing, especially as it gets colder. Do I continue using it at this rate or start using it once or twice a month depending on current temps?
2.Do I continue using this fertilizer while my orchids are in bloom? Some say not to & some say to continue.
3.(if i stop, do i begin again after the flowers fall off?)
Can I use the same Orchid food I use on my phals on my Miltonia?
4.+Completely my fault but I had left 3 of my phal orchids in the sun for a too long resulting for them to, unfortunately, suddenly drop their flowers. Do I continue to use the food/fertilizer on them like normal to continue growth/rehabilitation?

Sorry for all the questions! I have many more of them to come, I just want to keep all of my plants happy & healthy

[aliceinwl]

I fertilize my Phalaenopsis and my Trader Joe’s Miltonia Sunset look alike year round. I use about half the recommended fertilizer dose every other week. These guys are always growing something (leaves, roots, or flowers)

I was gifted some Miracle Gro orchid mix and it had a lot of fine particles and slow release fertilizer granules already incorporated. I’ve used a 50:50 mix of the Miracle Gro mix and BetterGro coarse mix for my Miltoniopsis successfully but the Oncidium type I tried it on wasn’t happy. I’m not sure how well Phalaenopsis would do in it. I’ve gone ahead and fertilized normally despite the granules and the Miltoniopsis are happy. Maybe the Miltonia Sunset will like it?

I use MSU fertilizer. I think I remember reading that the Miracle Gro had nitrogen as urea and it wasn’t available to orchids, but I could be totally wrong. I also had some Miracle Gro fertilizer when I started out and I used it on my outdoor orchids with no ill effects.

I have my Miltonia Sunset in fine bark and I try to water whenever the substrate approaches dryness. It’s a really tough vigorous plant, but gets a lot of cold damage if subjected to prolonged exposure to temperatures below 60. So far, it is my most cold intolerant orchid (my Phalaenopsis have more tolerance than it does).

[orchidlauren]

Thank you for the advice on the Miltonia, I’ll start fertilizing as you said aswell as going out for the substrates as listed. How do you know when to repot your Miltonia? The Miltonia I purchased from Trader Joe’s has very fine soil, and comparing to your mix is a drastic difference.

[orchidlauren]

Miltonia Substrate pics

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by orchidlauren

The food suggests using it every 2 weeks but in my opinion that seems persistent in fertilizing, especially as it gets colder.

1/4 to 1/3 of their recommended dosage is what I've read from some sources and word of mouth. I've been following this scheme all along.

I just use fertiliser once a month. Eg. beginning of each month... I apply fertiliser. Then use regular water for 2 weeks. Then at the middle of the month, I apply calcium/magnesium solution. Then regular water for 2 weeks. Then we reach the next month... so back to fertiliser again - once. But, if any solution is left-over on the day of application... then I just top-up the left-over solution with water and just water with this even weaker solution.... so as not to waste anything.

This scheme has worked excellently for my amateur hobby orchid growing.... for years. I'm fine with the scheme - as I have orchids sitting outdoors in plastic pots (in lava rock media) that have never been manually fertilised --- they probably get natural fertiliser with bugs/insects etc in their pots. Those orchids required no maintainence for a few decades.... watered by automatic sprinkler along with the lawn and shrubs. These orchids are big and strong.... flowering every year. So - for my other orchids, fertilising once a month has been just fine.

[Ray]

Ask a dozen growers about feeding and you'll get at least 13 opinions!

Personally, I think it pays to think of fertilizing like providing meals for yourself - it is healthier to eat frequent, small meals than it is to gorge oneself every few days. Likewise, if you think about orchids in nature, they get "fed" a minuscule amount every time the rain starts falling, plus whatever microbes provide.

How much fertilizer you use should be primarily controlled by the frequency of application, but I think a total of about 100 ppm N applied over a week is a good target.

When I had a greenhouse with close to 1000 plants, if fed at every watering by using a metering pump to add it to my water supply at 25 ppm N. In the summer, they got 3-4 feedings a week, but in winter when the weather was gray, I sometime only watered once a week, but as the plants weren't doing much, that low amount was fine.

Now that I have downsized and only have a couple of dozen plants, I feed one time per week year-round @ 100 ppm N.

Don't let the units scare you: divide 8 by the %N on your fertilizer label. The result is the teaspoons per gallon for 100 ppm N.

If I've got the right formula, your fertilizer is a 30-10-10, so 8/30=0.2667 tsp/gal. If you used 1/4, you'd be fine.

Orchids can use urea-based nitrogen, but root uptake is reduced compared to nitrate and ammonium sources.

[orchidlauren]

Thank you for that info, I’ll be sure to follow the measurements you guy’s have suggested & how often you would use it, without that info I’d most likely be going all over the place ahah; And, would I continue to fertilize my sun damaged phals like normal or allow them to take a break? I know that they need more enrgy to heal themselves.

[aliceinwl]

Regarding repotting the Miltonia, I’ve tried everything and I can not keep roots alive in that fine soil like substrate (ProMix). I now repot any plants I buy in it as soon as I get them home. I give them a quick soak, spray as much of the old mix out with the hose as possible, and pot them up. Don’t worry about getting every little bit out and try to manipulate the roots as little as possible. If you’re gentle with the roots, the plants don’t miss a beat and keep their flowers. Every time I’ve waited until the plant finished blooming, I was left with almost 100% dead roots and a plant that took at least a year to recover.

I’ve also learned with these: do not cut the roots. Even the ones that seem dead. I think the inner root is still functional even when the outer envelope is squishy. The plants where I’ve left even seemingly dead roots intact don’t blast their flowers or show any signs of stress following repotting. Those that I’ve tried to clean up dead roots on, however, do often blast at least some flowers.

None of these plants really take a break. The sun damaged Phals are going to want to push out new leaves and heal what damage they can: I’d just fertilize as usual with whatever formulation / regime you decide to adopt.

[Ray]

The fuel plants need are the sugars they produce from light and the building blocks in air, water, and only a tiny bit of fertilizer. When a plant is adding tissue (growing), it uses them all as building blocks.

In my opinion, plants need a very small but steady supply of food. A horticulture professor friend once did the chemical process calculations, and for any plant to add a pound of new tissue, it must absorb and process about 25 gallons of water, but only 5 grams of N+P+K.

[SouthPark]

The fertiliser in say bark or rock media is likely going to be hanging around for a while.

So applying fertiliser once a month doesn't mean that the fertiliser is gone (disappeared) after just 1 day. With a suitable dosage - even if relatively infrequent (eg. once a month) - the orchid can have enough fertiliser to grow very well, year in and year out.

For optimising growth rate etc, some research needs to be done to determine a schedule and dosage (taking into account growing environment etc) that allows for good growth rate. This would be the scientific approach - which is very good.

Maybe every few months or so - or perhaps even once a year, a serious flushing of the media with water can be beneficial - to bring down accumulated build up of whatever is in the pot (salts etc).