Orchid Beginner Needs Advice

[SophieKatt]

Hello everyone, I am SophieKatt and recently adopted an orchid that I hope can be saved. She was in bad shape when I was given her; she was in potting soil, so I took her out of that immediately and sure enough, her roots were all rotted! She was so soggy that I let her air-dry for a day, then put her in bark medium. She had two green leaves but they were leathery & wrinkly; that means dehydration, correct? I tried to revive the leaves by giving her a good soak, (from the bottom, just like the videos on YouTube say to do!) with some Orchid Food in the water. But now the leaves look worse than ever - very discouraging! Are the leaves getting yellow from too much water, perhaps?? Some new growth is coming in (a new healthy air root also) between the two big leaves(see photos). Are the two big leaves dying because the plant is concentrating energy on the new growth? Happily, the new growth is coming in fast. The plant has 3 other air roots, they're sort of green near the stalk, but further out from the plant they're sort of wrinkled & in bad shape - should I cut them off & keep only the green part?? Also the little bitty roots on the bottom seem completely dead but I haven't done anything to them, yet. I thought maybe I should switch over to the sph. moss instead of the bark, since the plant is so sick - what do you guys think? Any advice on what to do (or NOT do!) is very much appreciated!

[estación seca]

Welcome to the Orchid Board!

There is a thread here dealing with exactly this issue. From the left yellow menu choose Forums then Beginners. Near the top look for a sticky thread The Phal abuse stops here.

[Dollythehun]

First. Don't cut anything off, even the core of a dead root can give stability and transmit water. You'll get many different opinions, here's mine: I would pot it up in a smallish pot, in bark or moss. I would tent it with a plastic bag (poke a hole or two in the top.) If in moss, keep it barely moist. Bark, water, lift, notice weight. Water when light again. You have a couple air roots, and new growth. That's promising. Other opinions will follow. Don't over analyze this.

[SophieKatt]

Thanks very much for your help!

[SouthPark]

One possible setup for helping the orchid along is to do what I do here.

A mini humidity box, with some openings up at the top
(of the see-through plastic casing) for some air-movement.

I have air-movement outside of the container, and the positions of the two off-axis openings at the top of the humidity box allow some air to go in and get some air-movement inside too.

And I spray some water inside the box - on the floor. And the pots sit on drainage grates.

In the attached pic, I could easily put an orchid inside ---- such as the purple potted one.

The humidity and slight air-movement inside can help support little orchids if they need support.

Google drive links (higher res) below:

Pic 1 link (removed cover)
Pic 2 link (with cover)

[SouthPark]

I forgot to mention ----- boxes or containers like that can come in various sizes. Or we could make one ourselves (eg. small fish-tank/aquarium).