Wet roots on my Phal?

[whitetshirtguy]

So to use rocks, like below, is not a good idea?


I'll go get the pot and the media and I'll repot when I can, then.
Do you think that repotting now will be too harmful for the buds?

Thanks,
W.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

It depends on what it is. I'm not sure what the rocks in the pic are. They might be diatomite.

Diatomite is fine. It is a highly porous silicon based mud rock. It has excellent water retention properties, but it doesn't retain the moisture for quite as long as Sphagnum does, and it does not retain water the same way either.

Volcanic rock might be fine to use, but I haven't used it before. The disadvantage of volcanic rock is that it has a lot of sharp edges.

This is a similar principle to semi-hydroponic methods of horticulture. It's not quite the same thing as true semi-hydroponics though.

True semi-hydroponic techniques have been known to work as well, but I'm not well versed in that matter.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

I didn't catch the other question...

I don't think repotting while the plant is in bud is harmful to the plant or the buds, as I've stated in the sticky. However, the caveat being that if the roots are heavily damaged during repotting, then yes, it will affect the plant and the buds as well.

Another thing to consider since the plant is in bud is that, when you decide to repot, you can't dilly-dally, you must repot the plant as quickly as you can to avoid stressing the plant out. Once the plant is stressed, it will most definitely drop the buds.

More-often-than-not, the plant will be okay if they're repotted right now.

Although, if you repot asap and the plant drops its buds, you gotta think about how the plant has a better chance of being safe from peril and may live to bloom another season. In this scenario, there is no fear of never seeing any blooms later down the line. You'll probably sacrifice the blooms for the plant once, so that the plant may survive and continue to bloom for many years to come.

[whitetshirtguy]

I was referring to Bob's comment that "the more manipulation you do on the roots the more likely it is that the buds will blast (fall off)".

I will see if I can find proper rocks or bark (or both) and will repot as soon as I can, then.

Thank you very much for all your answers, this has been really helpful.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

If you really want to use "rocks" with bark, I'd like to suggest using either chunks of horticultural grade charcoal and/or large grade perlite.

Overly manipulating roots can cause bud blast if the plants are extremely sensitive to having their roots disturbed. In the case of Phal hybrids, I don't think you need to worry about that kind of sensitivity as much as you would with Phal species. It can depend on the individuals as well, but generally speaking there is no need to worry that the buds will drop, when they are repotted when they're in bud.

Like I said, even if they did drop buds - so what? If the plant is alive and has enough energy to bloom, it'll bloom again at the next bloom cycle. A dead plant won't give you anything.

[whitetshirtguy]

I don't know if I really want to use rocks, but I'm too anxious and I'm afraid I'll always overwater it, so using rocks seamed like a good idea to me. Is it not?
Even more considering that the plant seems to already have been overwatered at the store.
The climate here is also pretty hot and humid, so I'm afraid that 100% organic media wouldn't last for too long, and I don't trust my talent to repot the phal very often.
Does that makes sense? If even considering all that it would be better to use all bark I could do that too. Is that the case?

If I do use rocks, though, the charcoal seems like a very good suggestion, especially since it seems to be easily available here.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

I understand the reluctance to use a 100% organic potting mix. I forgot to take your climate into consideration.

Like I said, it really depends on the rocks you're using. You have to do research on the kinds of "rocks" you're thinking of using and their properties.

Different rocks, different properties.

Like I said, diatomite might be an option or perhaps a horticultural material such as LECA or PrimeAgra might be the way for you, idk.

I've never grown Phals in full charcoal, so I can't tell you how that'd go.

I wouldn't technically call charcoal a rock, btw.

[whitetshirtguy]

Ok, I'll see what kind of rocks I can find around here and look them up. I think I can find charcoal easily. I'll see what else I can get.

I see a lot of people mixing rocks with sphagnum, but I didn't find much on mixing them with bark. If I use charcoal or find a better fitting rock, can I just mix it with say... 30% bark? Would that work?

Something else that crossed my mind is that people usually place the stones on the bottom for drainage and sphagnum on top, while on S/H the water stays mostly on the bottom. Could I place the majority of the bark on the bottom and rocks on top of it, so that the water from the bark would evaporate to the rocks, in a sort of a semi-semi-hydroponics?

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

For a few examples of rocks...

There are:

granites
sandstones
mud stones

There are much, much more. All I can tell say is that if you plan on using rocks other than diatomite (which is a mud stone) for growing Phals, I really don't know what to say.

Products like PrimeAgra and LECA are just a few of the horticultural products out there that are inert and inorganic that people have had success with growing Phals with.

Other than these I can't say.

I have a difficult time recommending sandstones or granites. I don't use nor have I ever used granites for growing Phals. I use them for other plants, but not Phals.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

I've used pumice with sphag. I've used perlite with sphag. But again, I don't recommend this practice with Phals.

Masdevallias, okay.

Certain Cochelanthes, maybe.

Phals, absolutely not.

I really don't know what kinds of rocks you have in your area, and it'd be highly irresponsible of me to tell you to go ahead and use whatever rocks you can find in your area.

Like I said, you really gotta be sure of the kind of rocks you have at hand and what their properties are. Then you gotta figure out how the plant would react to being grown in it.

Not any rock will do, you gotta be careful.

The safest bet is to use materials used for semi-hydroponics or diatomite. All bets are off if you're gonna use anything else. I'm really just not that familiar with growing Phals in rocks.