Winter Watering Woes for Orchids!

[Orchid doctor]

Hey Orchid Lovers! 🌿💕

Navigating the tricky waters of winter orchid care? Let's chat about the watering challenges our green pals face during the chilly season:

1. Cool It on the Watering: Orchids might be a bit moody in winter. Ease up on the watering – their roots like a cozy break.

2. Say No to Cold Feet: Cold water isn’t a friend. Use lukewarm water when hydrating your orchids. They'll appreciate the warmth!

3. Watch the Overwatering Trap: Winter makes orchids more susceptible to overwatering. Check soil moisture and adjust your watering routine accordingly.

[REDACTED by Moderator]

[WaterWitchin]

Welcome to Orchid Board. Please review this excerpt from the Rules and Guidelines:

• Commercial Business.
This forum relies on sponsor advertising for its existence. If you would like to advertise your venture, become a sponsor by contacting a moderator or administrator. Linking to a commercial website in a signature line may be permitted at moderator discretion by established members, with a minimum of 100 posts plus a one-year time period as a member of Orchid Board. Once a member has been granted permission by the moderator, the requesting member is allowed links to their legitimate business selling orchids and/or orchid related useful in orchid growing in their signature line and/or Classified Section.

The entirety of Rules and Guidelines can be found here.

RULES & GUIDELINES

[Orchid doctor]

Dear Administrator,

I wanted to clarify the purpose of my website that I tried to link in my signature. I am a master's student creating a website blog focused on orchid care as a project for my studies. My site does not involve any commercial business or online selling.

I sincerely apologize for the confusion. As a student member with less than 100 posts, I now understand that I should not have included a link in my signature yet. I have removed the link to avoid any further misunderstanding(I think you already did).

Please let me know if I can provide any other clarification. I enjoy being part of this community and learning more about orchid care. As a student exploring this as a topic for my studies, I highly value the insights from this forum's experienced orchid growers. If you grant permission once I meet the qualifications for a link as an established member, I would be grateful. In the meantime, I will continue contributing what I learn without including any signature link.

Thank you for your guidance on following the proper rules and etiquette, and my apologies again. Please let me know if you have any other feedback or need any clarification from my end.

[Ray]

I will start by saying that I applaud your effort, but I'll play a "devil's advocate" for a moment...

The "cold feet" part of your statement is quite valid, but the other two statements and a lot of the stuff at your linked website is quite subjective and therefore is very limited in its application.

Your selection of "best products" is questionable, as far as I'm concerned - for the same reasons and others - and makes you sound like more of a shill than an experienced grower. With very few exceptions, any comment of something being "best" should be completed with "for me, under my conditions".

1) Individual orchids need what they need.

2) How you get there can vary widely, depending upon the specific growing conditions of the individual and their habits/abilities to generally care for the specific plants they have.

3) What works great for you might not work at all for another.

[Roberta]

A few more flags that say "inexperienced grower", along with "best", add "always" and "never". Since orchids rarely do anything fast, often even die slowly, after awhile one learns to qualify statements... "under my conditions" (with description so others can decide whether the advice is useful or not for them) , "for some period of time", "for this particular type of orchid". There are exceptions for essentially any "rule". That is not surprising since orchids come from every continent except Antarctica, elevations from sea level to above treeline, from the tropics to the Arctic. The same "rules" do not apply to all. And even when all those waffle words are taken into account and one has years of experience, one becomes humbled when a plant that has done wonderfully for 10 years suddenly crashes. For reasons unknown. It happens...

When you give advice, don't forget the "why" part. That's a valuable key to whether the advice is applicable in a particular situation for someone else.

[minicoerulea]

I help moderate an animal care forum. There, when I see a new account with a link to any website that contains Amazon links, especially with questionable info on products that has been lifted from the item description ('quarantined ingredients'? do they hold the bark for forty days to see if it develops symptoms of disease?) the account is considered spam and gets banned, cleaned and info sent to the online blacklist service.

There's a trend in animal care circles toward a multitude of sites with extremely general (and too often fairly inaccurate) content claiming they're 'comprehensive' and 'all you need to know' and getting a lot of naive readers into bad situations. It wouldn't improve the orchid hobby for that to become more prevalent.

[Roberta]

Just a few examples of orchids that don't want reduced water in winter...(I have a yard full of orchids that get cold and wet when it rains, they are happy. In well drained medium, many in baskets or mounted)

Stanhopeas - dry them out and they lose their leaves and can take several years to recover

Maxillaria scalariformis - dry it out and you'll kill it. May need to be kept a bit warmer, though, moves into the greenhouse. Where it is sopping wet all the time.

Mediterranean-climate terrestrials are just entering their growth phase, water them heavily

Epidendrum lacustre - needs to be sopping wet.

Anything mounted - needs to be watered nearly daily due to fast drying.

Pleurothallids in general - no pseudobulbs, fine roots, often come from high elevations - need to stay wet.

Bulbophyllums - many but not all want to be warm, but with the exception of a few like Bulb. falcatum that does need a drier rest, they want to be wet.

And the list goes on and on.

[estación seca]

OD - we definitely welcome you here and look forward to your posts. Growers with different growing conditions constantly show me new things here, which is a big reason I read Orchid Board.

I read your original post opening this thread before WW edited it. The members who have already posted to this thread have together more than 200 years' growing experience.

I studied science long ago. The others posting to this thread did, too. My professors taught me to read extensively before designing projects and experiments, so I wouldn't duplicate what somebody else had done, and so I would understand the many aspects of the question I was trying to solve. There is a very large body of information here in the various forums, and I know you'll enjoy learning here.

[rbarata]

Originally Posted by estación seca

The members who have already posted to this thread have together more than 200 years' growing experience.

Nah...you together are not that old. Just wise!

[Orchid doctor]

Originally Posted by Ray

I will start by saying that I applaud your effort, but I'll play a "devil's advocate" for a moment...

The "cold feet" part of your statement is quite valid, but the other two statements and a lot of the stuff at your linked website is quite subjective and therefore is very limited in its application.

Your selection of "best products" is questionable, as far as I'm concerned - for the same reasons and others - and makes you sound like more of a shill than an experienced grower. With very few exceptions, any comment of something being "best" should be completed with "for me, under my conditions".

1) Individual orchids need what they need.

2) How you get there can vary widely, depending upon the specific growing conditions of the individual and their habits/abilities to generally care for the specific plants they have.

3) What works great for you might not work at all for another.

Thank you for taking the time to share your insights and play the "devil's advocate" on my recent post about orchids. I appreciate constructive feedback from experienced members like yourself, as it provides an opportunity for me to learn and improve on my writing.

I completely understand your point about subjectivity, especially when it comes to labeling certain products as the "best." Your reminder about individual orchids having unique needs and the variability in growing conditions is well-taken. I will definitely keep that in mind moving forward.

On the other side, playing "devil's advocate" to your comment - isn't "Best" subjective? like best phone, best movie, best city, etc.
or you would think that, while writing it is a good practice to specify. Thanks again for helping me learn!

---------- Post added at 05:25 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:18 PM ----------

Thank you Roberta, WW, Estacion Ceca,
Minicoerulea all for your feedback and explanation.
I would definitely be mindful of posting content (go over existing first to not have duplication) and semantics of writing (shy away from always, never, best, etc.).