The Phal abuse ends here.

[fotofashion]

Phals bloom for a long time usually, so, I would keep them under the lights unless you need to use them to decorate a table for a short time. According to the "color" of the lamps, the flowers might look even prettier under the lights.
I don't understand your following question about the distance from the lamps.
Beverly A.

[Jayfar]

Originally Posted by alley

About how far away should I place the plants from the actual fixture? Same as with sun? Thanks!!!!

Hmm, placing the chids 93 million miles from your light fixture is probably impractical and may not yield enough illumination.

[silken]

Originally Posted by alley

Philip, I'm wanting to get some T5's for my phals. I have 4 phals....how many bulbs and at what Kelvin each should I be looking for? thanks in advance

I'm no expert on this but I don't think anyone addressed this question for you. The T5's I have are from Sunblaster SunBlaster Lighting - Fluorescent lighting for home, garden and business. Here is some info on them. As it says they are 6400k which is a fairly full spectrum light which covers the blooming and growing needs fairly well. These lights are quite bright and I don't even keep my phals under them. I use them for cattleyas, dendrobiums and other orchids requiring fairly bright light. If you are putting phals under them, I would probably have the fixtures at least 2 feet or even more above them. If you keep an eye on the plants and watch for sunburn then you will know if it is too close. Since I just use a 60W fluorescent bulb and some natural daylight for my own phals, I can't say for sure. 4 phals would do fine near an eastern window or even a southern one with shading or a western one. Just make sure the leaves don't actually get warm from the sun (or lights). If you still want to use the T5's, 1 or 2 would be plenty.

Maybe someone else with more technical knowledge will have an opinion but that is my thought. Hope that helps.

[alley]

Originally Posted by silken

I'm no expert on this but I don't think anyone addressed this question for you. The T5's I have are from Sunblaster SunBlaster Lighting - Fluorescent lighting for home, garden and business. Here is some info on them. As it says they are 6400k which is a fairly full spectrum light which covers the blooming and growing needs fairly well. These lights are quite bright and I don't even keep my phals under them. I use them for cattleyas, dendrobiums and other orchids requiring fairly bright light. If you are putting phals under them, I would probably have the fixtures at least 2 feet or even more above them. If you keep an eye on the plants and watch for sunburn then you will know if it is too close. Since I just use a 60W fluorescent bulb and some natural daylight for my own phals, I can't say for sure. 4 phals would do fine near an eastern window or even a southern one with shading or a western one. Just make sure the leaves don't actually get warm from the sun (or lights). If you still want to use the T5's, 1 or 2 would be plenty.

Maybe someone else with more technical knowledge will have an opinion but that is my thought. Hope that helps.

Thanks so much, it helps tremendously. I was afraid that the T5's would be too much if I kept them too close to the light...but I just don't seem to be getting enough light from my windows. There is a lot of shade in my yard, which I know filters the sun more than desirable, and my windows are relatively small. Sometimes I put the phals outside on the patio for a few hours and they seem to really like that, but with Fall coming, the temperatures will be too cool to do that. Thanks for your help Silken...

[alley]

Originally Posted by fotofashion

Phals bloom for a long time usually, so, I would keep them under the lights unless you need to use them to decorate a table for a short time. According to the "color" of the lamps, the flowers might look even prettier under the lights.
I don't understand your following question about the distance from the lamps.
Beverly A.

Beverly, thanks. What I meant was how far from the plant should I mount the lighting fixture so as not to burn the phals. By sun, I really meant window with no shade...sorry. But Silken advised that I place them 2 ft from the bulbs, so I'll start there and see how it goes...and I will place the blooming ones under the lights along with the ones I'm trying to get to spike per your advice..thanks again...

[Mango2007]

I am a proud owner of two phallus (a white one and a purple one). I am new to the plant world and have been making sure to heed all the advice not to overwater my orchids and make sure they are not overfertilized and get bright indirect sun with proper air circulation. Whew!


My problem is with my white phal. Its petals are getting weird, bright, green spots on them. The spots are no bigger than a marker point.

Also the underside of the leaves have chew marks. The orchid came this way. The marks look like they are healing but they are still there. I think I saw a small, translucent-like bug crawling around in the phal's soil a couple weeks prior.


Any suggestions on how to help the phal?

[alley]

I have some antique tins (small, decorated) that I thought my phals would look nice planted in. I poked holes in the bottoms of them with a hole punch-as many as I could. My question, in hindsight, is, will the tin metal hurt the plant? And what if there is rust? I can definitely re-pot them in plastic and sit them into the pots if you think that is what I should do....Thanks in advance, Alley

[RosieC]

I would put them in pots inside the tins is you want to use them, but I think they will rust either way. I've had a tin sitting in my greenhouse which get's wet often when I'm watering other things. I've just thrown it out because it was thick with rust after about 12 months.

[alley]

Thanks Rosie. I'm sure they will rust as well, which I'm not worried about as much as the harm it may do to the roots of the orchid. Do you think the metal itself is bad for them?

[RosieC]

I'm not sure the affect of high levels of iron on the plants. Personally I would avoid it, but that's just a gut feeling, hopefully someone else might know more for certain.