Maxillaria tenuifolia Survives Despite Negilgent Owner, Needs Help!

[petitchouchou]

Dear Orchidboard,

This is a desperate cry for help. I'd slash my wrists, if I had wrists, or post racy photos of myself on the internet, if facebook would extend membership to my taxonomy.

Instead, I turn to you, people of the internet.

I've come this far, despite rampant neglect, starvation, and the sort of treatment that

It didn't start out this way. I was raised on a blissful little farm out in Hilo, Hawaii, but only had a couple of years of the island life before I was shipped to a nursery in Northern California. I was a tiny plant, just old enough to flower on my own but not yet schooled in the ways of the world. I was taken to an orchid show in San Francisco, and some awful girl (more on her later)

The last eight years of my life have been a version of hell that makes. Five moves, including being taken against my will across the country to this bleak place called New York, where it's every plant for themselves. Over the years, I've been subjected to torture like severe cold when my captor says she "forgot to pay the bill" or "just wanted to crack the window open for some fresh winter air". (Bitch.) At times I've put up with air so dry it makes wood crack and split before your eyes, and both extreme exposure to sun and utter blackness for weeks on end. And worst of all, the water torture. Or rather, the water-LESS torture. I've gone for up to a month without any sort of exposure to liquid. I've lost more leaves than I can count, grown so many precious inches of root, only to watch it dry out and fall apart. It's given me a newfound sense of solidarity with the leper community, or what I imagine will be the case if I ever get to meet some lepers. As Is, I'm sort of permanently stuck here forever, unless I stage a jailbreak (but one step a t a time here…).

I've been doing pushups when my captor has been out at work, and trying to get strong, but this morning I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the mirrored coffee table I sit on and nearly dropped my bark shavings all over the parquet floor.

There's no way to put it nicely: I look like shit. I've got two leaves left -- count 'em -- and at this point a combover isn't even an option. My pseudobulbs are wrinkly beyond the point of help from any plastic surgeon (and over my dead body would you ever catch me in a place like that), and the only think between my pale, naked roots and the outside world is a few disintegrating old pieces of bark that I've been wearing since puberty. Just take a look at the photo I've attached below. Go ahead, laugh if you want. I don't care.

But I'll be damned if I respire my last breath under the rule of the flighty piece of work who is my "caretaker" (what a euphemism!)

How do I nurse myself back to health? I want to be able to feel young and carefree again, to let my many leaves, so green, so healthy, wave in the breeze. To unfurl the petals of my blooms in the sun and release their awe-inspiring coconutty fragrance over everything.

This is where I need your help, forum members: How do I get from here to there? There are no steroids here (believe me, I checked one day) but there is water, some plant food that smells like fish, and a grow light.


If you got to the end of this letter, II'm impressed. I doff my cap to you, dear reader.


Larry T. (I'd call myself Max, but all my other cousins do, and it gets confusing at family reunions.)

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

1. Find a 2 inch pot, (preferably a clear plastic pot, but it isn't necessary). Put it in there.

2. Put it in a mixture of SuperSphag and perlite (or pumice).

Another potting media option would be small grade CHC (coconut husk chips).

3. Place in bright indirect light.

4. Water twice a week.

5. Fertilize once every two weeks at 1/2 the recommended concentration on the bottle. Make sure the fertilizer is urea free.

6. Be on your game. Any more neglect, and this thing's gone for sure.

7. It'll take at least 3 yrs to bounce back from this kind of damage, if it will at all.

8. There is also a group project on the OB being done for this plant.

Scroll down the page with the listing of the forums and look for the forum that says "Member Projects" and browse to find it (it's a sticky at the top of the page and the heading is called "Maxillaria tenuifolia (2010 summer project)").

[Connie Star]

Dear Larry T,
You could go to the Sphag 'n Bag Spa to recuperate. There you will find a clear plastic bag with a few air holes in it. You will have a nice bed of moistened sphagnum moss to lie on, away from direct light. You must first rid yourself of all of your old disintegrating medium. A few sips of dilute Superthrive every 2 weeks or so will aid in your recovery. When you find your new roots poking out you can carefully begin to slip out of your bag a few inches at a time.
Good luck, and have a relaxing time at the spa!

[Lady Tottington]

Oh Larry T! It sounds like you've really been through the ringer, but you know what they say, you are never given more than you can handle, right? Look at you, what a fighter, I see you still have a couple of good punches left. You will make it just fine. Listen to what Philip said, the small pot will help, and I bet, I just bet, that your captor is really wanting what's best for you, proven by her letting you have internet access and posting here. Give her a chance. Let her prove her love and devotion to you. The regular water like Philip suggested will sooo greatly help you, and you can read the project thread of all sorts of Max relatives that you will be glad to know you have! I have a Max that the damn cat broke a string of 5 bulbs off, and I rooted them in some water and they are now planted up in a small tiny pot with sphag and bark, and they have shown me that I can't overwater them, afterall, they grew great roots and a little pseudobulb when just in a little jam jar with water that got changed weekly.

You'll make it Larry. Tell your old lady that you love her and forgive her, and she'll treat you right. We all make mistakes, but a great motto is "learn by doing!"

[RosieC]

Well I'm growing one of your cousins a different way.

I have a mounted Max tenuifolia, it is strapped on to a lump of cork, with moss arround the roots. It get's watered every day and seems really happy (new growths now forming new bulbs).

I've not had him long, part of the project mentioned above. Here's a link to the thread, jumping in at the point where I posted pictures of mine when I got it on it's mount.

The advantage of mounted is that you can water every day, getting lots of water in to it, mine really plumped up from the pictures in the link above.

HOWEVER... mounted orchids do need daily attention... so if neglect is a problem then it may not be the best for you. It works for me, because overwatering is more my problem

[RosieC]

Oh yeah, and take a look at the rest of the thread about the project for this orchid.

Scroll up/go back some pages from my link and find the BIG version someone posted a picture of (Mauro's picture I think)... then when you've seen that go back further through the thread and find the MASSIVE one... you'll know it when you see it, it's the one with the girl standing next to it and it's almost as tall as her!!!