Help! More light, smaller leaves?

[Phal grower]

Hi. Some of my Phals were growing smaller leaves than I liked. I grow under fluorescents with some natural light so I figured I would move them closer to the lights. Now the new leaves are even smaller. To much light? Any ideas would help. Thankyou.

[Junebug]

Hmmm. Sounds odd. Have you checked the health of your roots lately? Sometimes root rot will result in dwarfed leaves. My phals receive quite a bit of sunlight (more than you'd think was safe) and they're leaves are large and healthy. Please note: my phals were gradually transitioned to brighter sunlit conditions.

[Phal grower]

Thanks for the reply. The roots are doing fine, recently repotted and growing well. I did put them from about 10in. to 3in. under the lights without a gradual transition. Wonder if that could be the problem? Would they be shocked by the sudden increase in fluorescent light?

[Ray]

I suppose there could be some logic there - stronger light exposure might suggest the plant would need less chlorophyll to produce sufficient energy, and I know it is possible to grow them too bright, causing them to do poorly, but I've not seen smaller leaves.

On the other hand, I have seen such resulting from nutrition issues n

[RosieC]

I know this happens with my Masdies and one of the nurseries confirmed they believe higher light can produce smaller leaves in Masdies (in fact I didn't even need to say I suspected the light, I just said they were growing more compact leaves then the ones when I bought them and the guy said "High Light" straight away).

I'm not talking about Phals, I know. But I think the principle could be the same. As Ray says, I believe they are getting enough energy from the smaller leaves so don't growth them any bigger.

However it could also be roots/nutrition so I would definitely check the roots. My Masdies are growing masses and masses of leaves and flowering well so I don't think that is a problem in my case, but definitely worth checking in yours.

[Fernando]

Moving the plants towards the light surely will have changed the humidity an the temps. The tree factors together give smaller leaver, usually stronger and thicker.

Fer

[cday2inflorida]

I don't grow orchids under lights There are experts, here). I do grow gesneriads and begonias. When I went to high output. They seemed to have dried out overnight. I added domes to everything. It took them about a week or so to adjust to the higher light. The added humidity helped.

[Phal grower]

Thankyou all for the comments.