Good Phal Potting Mix??

[Pikachu]

this is my first post so again. Anyways what's a good potting mix for my Phalanopsis. Currently it's in Sphagnum Moss. Any Advice ??

[WhiteRabbit]

Most likely the easiest to obtain would be a medium grade fir bark mix for orchids.

[camille1585]

Welcome!
I agree, a medium grade bark mix is good. If you have a bigbox store near you, a good mix is 'Better-Gro Special Orchid Mix'. Soak it overnight beforehand, prune any mushy/hollow roots off the plant and then you can repot it.

[Jayfar]

I've just gone through repotting my small newbie collection in a mix recommended by mayres, which gets rave reviews in a thread in another orchid forum (he mentions his mix in a few posts in this forum). His mix is roughly 75% coir, 20% perlite and 5% charcoal.

I bought a 12 scoop Select-A-Blend bag from repotme.com with 8 scoops coarse coir, 3 scoops small sponge rock aka perlite and 1 scoop small charcoal, which is as close as I can get to Mike's proportions by ordering that way; works out to approx 67% coir, 25% perlite and 8% charcoal. I'm using the slotted clear pots from repotme and packing peanuts in the bottom. I soaked the mix in normal dilutions of Grow More 20-10-20, Neptune's Harvest liquid seaweed and a little epsom salt, mixed well and then drained and squeezed out in a colander.

The coir mix is certainly a lot airier than the tightly compacted spagnum that I just freed several of my favorite Phals from. On one plant alone I spent about a 20 minutes undoing the tightly compacted spag from the root ball (and of course ended up trimming off about half the roots due to rot).

[Ray]

One of the important aspects of orchid growing that is often overlooked is that there is no one, single parameter that determines success or failure. Instead, it is the interactive combination of all of your cultural parameters that do.

A particular plant may have a target zone of temperature, light, humidity, nutrition, and water that would be ideal, but 1) they are - to some extent - adaptable, and 2) there are many ways to "skin a cat" when it comes to providing for its needs.

Questions like "what's the best medium" or "what's the best fertilizer or fertilizing regimen" are sort-of like "is it best to hold the plant with your left- or right hand when repotting?" The only time it might be appropriate to use someone else's suggestion with no further consideration is when they are growing similar plants in your same environment - i.e., your local friends and OS members.

So, when deciding on a potting medium, you have to consider:

1. The needs of the plant. How much, and how constant of a water supply does it want?
2. How does your temperature, humidity, light level, and air movement affect evaporation from the pot?
3. How much do you like to "mess with" your plants? That is, do you want to pay a lot of attention to them and water frequently, or would you prefer to just leave them alone?
4. Will you be using a plastic or clay pot?