What on earth????!!!!! My phal changed color

[gardengirl13]

One of my first orchids was a very nice white phal. It was the first I got to rebloom ever! And he did it twice more! This weekend his one bud looked ready to pop open for me, but had a purplish hue to it? OK? Well it is starting to open today and it's purple!? What the heck!? I bought it white, it's rebloomed 2-3 times white, and now it's purple? Is this possible? I know some can change slightly, and some are dyed, but this has bloomed multiple times white for me.

Here is the flower, I'll take a photo of it tomorrow when it opens more and post that one too.

[tucker85]

Obviously it can happen since it just happened to you. Personally this is the first time I've ever heard of a drastic color change like that. Are you absolutely sure it's the same orchid?

[TeresaE]

Could be that it originally had a purple hue that just wasn't as pronounced when it bloomed white the last time? I would like to see the difference for sure.

I actually have a Phal that blooms really different. Two different flowers on this spike. It's a Phal tetraspis. Cool eh? LOL

[gardengirl13]

Originally Posted by tucker85

Obviously it can happen since it just happened to you. Personally this is the first time I've ever heard of a drastic color change like that. Are you absolutely sure it's the same orchid?

Yeah I've never bought a purple orchid before. I recently (a few months ago bought one that's white and purple and I have a magenta one but it's also new.) I'm 100% positive this is the same orchid.

It's so strange! I mean to go from white since 2009 (the photos above were from 2010 and they're from the first rebloom I think) to purple? It's so drastic! ha ha!

---------- Post added at 07:21 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:19 PM ----------

Originally Posted by TeresaE

Could be that it originally had a purple hue that just wasn't as pronounced when it bloomed white the last time? I would like to see the difference for sure.

I actually have a Phal that blooms really different. Two different flowers on this spike. It's a Phal tetraspis. Cool eh? LOL

Like the photos it was very white. The bud that's opening seemed slightly purplish kind of stripy, I thought maybe it's just that way while it's opening this time. I'll take a photo tonight if it's opened enough.

---------- Post added at 07:43 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:21 PM ----------

OK the lighting is bad and my white balance is not getting the right colors, but here it is. The only thing different that I recently started using is I've used Jack's Classic 7-5-6 orchid fert which is purple. I looked it up very quickly, not doing tons of research, and not once has anyone said it turned their flowers a different color.





Here's what it looked like on Sunday.



Taking that photo is when I noticed the buds were kind of purplish. But it wasn't noticeable until it opened this afternoon.

I could only find info on how to dye your flowers and people complaining their blue orchids are now white. Which is silly, who really thinks orchids come in florescent bright blue? Especially when the tags say they're white and dyed.

I'm not really a fan of the purple and white stripped phal so I wouldn't have bought a purple one like this. I kind of m doubting myself with this looking at this flower. But this is the plant I've had for years. I'm 99.9% sure of that! It's driving me nuts though thinking I'm wrong! ha ha!! But I love that white orchid and all my other phals are in bloom and none are white. So it HAS to be that one! Maybe it the jack's? If so I'm not using it any more!! I may try to return it and get my normal fert instead.

[Rowangreen]

Phalaenopsis can change colour a bit due to different culture, eg different temperature or light levels. However that's more than just a bit... a bit of veining maybe, but the lip has gone from white to dark pink. And difficult to tell yet, but it looks like the proportions are different: the top one looks to have much larger petals in comparison to it's lip.

My explanations:
You mixed them up.
There were originally two different plants in the pot.
Someone swapped them for a joke
If you ever left someone looking after your orchids, they killed the old one and swapped if for a new one.

[quiltergal]

My guess would be that perhaps there were two different plants in the same pot and when you purchased it the other plant was in bloom. Does it look like a single plant or does it look like it has a basal Keiki?

[silken]

Even the lip is very different so my vote is that its a different plant as well.

[Bolero]

They must be mixed up, they can't change colour like that.

[NYCorchidman]

That is just impossible. Whie phal changing color like that in the second set of photos. It is a different plant.

I have a white phal with red lip that sometimes shows slight red veining or pink hue on the petals, but white phals never do.

[camille1585]

I can imagine a white Phal taking on purplish hues due to changes in light or temperature, but such a drastic change is just not possible. And it certainly is not due to the fertilizer! Do you have a photo of it fully open?

If there is absolutely no mistake in the ID of this plant, then the only thing I can think of it that there was a mutation, somewhere, either in the plant as it was growing, or in the spike. I have no idea how likely it is, and don't think I've heard of mutation completely changing the color/pattern like that.