Some spots on the roots.

[pinkchris2000]

Please see my last message in this thread with updated pictures!!!! Thank you!!!!





Hello, everyone. I bought this phal on March 8, 2011 and yesterday it was 1st watering. Today I notice that that external roots have some spots and one of the sides has some soft brownish root. It was not repotted. Please tell me what is it and what should I do to rescue this orchid?

Thank you,

This is one side. The upper root is soft and brownish.


This is the other side. I can see some "burn" spots on the roots.

[amandarenee]

Most of the time, the best thing to do after buying an orchid that is potted in sphagnum is to repot it. Most of the time the sphag is packed in there very tightly, so it will never try properly and will lead to root rot.

Soft and brown is not good for roots. I would get some new medium (bark is good, sphag is ok if you don't pack it in there and are careful about watering). The clear pot it is in is good. Just clean off the old sphag, check the roots for rot and snip off any dead/rotten roots with a sterilized knife or scissors.

[Zoi2]

Your roots are dry, time to water the plant. As amandarenee has mentioned, it would be a good idea to repot or at least pull out some of the sphag.
Joann

[RosieC]

I agree that those roots look really dry.

I get brown on the surface roots like that, I believe it to be from iron in the water (I know for certain we have high iron content in our water here). It's never seemed to cause a problem for me.

I would agree with the others about repoting, but I don't think it's related to that colouring on the routes.

[pinkchris2000]

Thanks, guys! I am going to repot it tomorrow. Hopefully it is going to be fine.

[pinkchris2000]

Ok, guys. I finally "unpacked" my orchid and that's what I saw next:










Here I can see something black right at the stem. What should I do?

I can see that some roots are very dry, some have black colour. What to do with "brown" roots? Please help me out it is my first orchid and first repotting. Thank you a lot!

[RosieC]

Brown is not bad in it's own right. Are the brown roots firm, or are they squishy. Firm means they are still good and probably just stained brown my the medium.

I think they look mostly OK, I'm not sure about the center of that last picture. I've seen ones similar but just cannot remember if I've ever seen it on ones that were healthy or ones I was having probelms with hopefually someone else can comment on that.