Damage on Phalaenopsis leafs - what could it be and how to cure it? - Orchid Board

LuizaG · #1 08-05-2010, 02:08 PM

Hi

My Phal has some damage on 2 leafs and I have no idea what it could be.

This is my second phal and I really do not want this to get into a terible state like my first one.

I really need help to find out what it could be and how to cure / prevent it from spreading.

Here are photos (at the botom of the page) with the leafs:
Picasa Web Albums - ChristiLuiza - Orchid

Also it appears to have a bit of a damage near to the botom of one leaf, at the crown. It was like this when I got it but now it seams to have gone worse.

It is poted tight into a 12 cm pot in bark and some sponge. It has been 3 weeks since I bought it and have not watered at all because it does not to get dry in the middle of the pot. (I insert a skewer to check.) I am really affraid of rot. For the first week I kept it on top of a saucer with water but gave up on that as the pot started to steam up inside and made the drying slower.
Last week I wiped the leafs with a damp coton ball with neem oil smeared on it as I've seen a small dark insect that moved very fast on the plant.

Today I've done the same but I not sure if there are insecs eating my leafs or if it's a virus or something else.

Could you help me diagnose and treat?
Luiza

bdelfiero · #2 08-05-2010, 08:56 PM

Your phal is very dehydrated....you need to water them as they need. Since it was potted in clear plastic pot, you can perfectly see the root development and when you see that the roots are turning white, it's time to water.

camille1585 · #3 08-05-2010, 10:32 PM

I agree, your plant is very badly dehydrated, but it's not a matter of watering more for it to recover. it just doesn't have enough roots to keep the leaves hydrated. However it does have a few roots, so is not a lost cause just yet.

At this point one course of action that I would suggest (and has worked for me on a rescued nearly rootless phal) is to repot it in the smallest pot that the roots will fit into. If you don't have anything, you will have to improvise like I did. I cut the top off a 0.5 liter plastic bottle at the height I needed, and burned drainage holes in the bottom using a nail heated over a flame.

Since the phal was so top heavy I stuck it in a larger clay pot to keep it upright, and then stuck everything in a clear plastic bag with damp paper towels at the bottom for humidity, and kept it out of direct sun. After a few months my phal had grown several new roots and a small new leaf.

In the future if you are ever in doubt about a new orchid you buy, unpot it to see what's going on below, and if needed change the medium. it could be that the medium this one came in was getting old and holding too much water. In clear pots you can look at the roots to know when to water. As long as the roots are green and there is condensation inside the pot, the plant is fine. Once that condensation is gone and the roots have turned silvery white you can water again.

frostedeyes · #4 08-06-2010, 01:39 AM

yeah dehydrated... but its not too late... just pot them tightly! that the base of the plant wont wiggle when u move your around.. the secret to make phals grow healthy roots is to pot them tight...of course watering and humidity also helps.

trdyl · #5 08-06-2010, 04:14 AM

Be sure not to over pot. Use a pot just large enough for the roots to fit in.

RosieC · #6 08-06-2010, 11:08 AM

I'm just wondering if everyone is looking at the wrong pictures.

The first in that album link are a very dehydrated orchid as everyone has commented. But your comments are about marks on the leaves and that matches the pictures near end of the album of pictures.

Can you let us know which of the pictures are for this problem or are they all relating to the problem?

I'm afraid if it's the ones at the bottom I've no idea what might have caused that. Hopefully someone else may.

camille1585 · #7 08-06-2010, 11:51 AM

Good point Rosie. I was looking at the top photos because I was assuming that they were the most recent, and I didn't even scroll down that far, and didn't even see the ones at the bottom!

cnarciso · #8 08-06-2010, 12:15 PM

Well, at first glance the damage on the leaves in lower pictures looks like it could be caused by thrips. I had some on my plants a while back and they produced similar marks. Spraying with a pesticide should help (maybe someone else can chime in and suggest one since I have not had much success with them in past). Be sure to get the undersides on the leaves as well since that is where the insects reside. If memory serves they look like tiny black flecks. They have a sucking mouthpart to drain the "juices" from the leaf, hence the collapsed portion where they have been feeding.

And just to agree with everyone else, you should water more because the plants in the top photos are badly dehydrated. you said somewhere that you water every 3-4 days which should be enough even with low humidity, did you soak the bark before potting?

LuizaG · #9 08-06-2010, 03:03 PM

Hi guys

Thanks a lot for all your replies.

To confirm, yes it was the pictures at the botom of the page that I was talking about, the leafs on the healthier phal, the ones with flowers, that Cnarciso said they might be eaten by thrips.

The Phal on top photos is my first Phal and had no idea how to care for it and it lost all it's roots except for one. It is now siting in a very small 7 cm pot, in the bathroom where there is lots of moisture and it is watered every 3 days. It seems to be doing well, the root is growing and so is the new leaf. Yes the bark was soaked before I used it.

But returning to the phal with it's leafs eaten by thrips, I have been treating it with neem oil on both sides of the leafs and hope that that should definately help. I do remember seing a small black, like a fly but long not round moving very fast on the leafs. But the thrips are not always there for me to see them, I wonder where they hide. If they hide in the medium ... how do I het them out of there without repoting as the plant is in flower now?

Hope somebody has some good ideas.
Luiza

camille1585 · #10 08-06-2010, 03:56 PM

I'm quite certain that that is not thrips damage. Having done research on them for 8 months a few years back, I'm not an expert, but am quite familiar with them. For one you wouldn't see such large patches of damage unless there was a bad infestation. And you would see smaller areas of damage a bit everywhere on the leaf.

Seeing the slight yellow discoloration around the lesions, I think it's more disease related, probably bacterial. Have those spots been noticeably increasing in size?