When to Spike?

[lornaheath]

Anyone help my mixed up logic please?

I am thinking that these Orchids mainly have flowers on them for three months.

I am thinking they're there say June, July and August.

Now I don't know what to think about when the Spike starts??

I look every day at my plants and scan them for new spikes but am I wasting my time? It's now mid flowering season isn't it? So if they're not flowering right now, then they won't until next summer.

So am I better waiting until the end of the year or part way through the winter season to see the spikes appearing? If they are to flower through the summer months then it must be way too early to start growing a spike right now?

Confused in England.

Lorna
x x x

[james mickelso]

Some orchids have a definite flowering period. Hybridizing changes that. Phals have been hybridized to death. So give the phal what it wants and it will flower when it has built up enough reserves to do it. AOS had a great article back in the late 90's that detailed the flowering of phals. They said put the phal in a very dim position for x number of days and cool it down a tad and then put it back in normal light and voila....flowers. Something like that. Just take care of it properly and when it is time, it will flower. Here is why you can find flowering orchids nearly any time of the year while our orchids languish flowerless. The orchids you find with flowers have been force grown in green houses with nearly constant light, warmth, moisture, food, and a steady breeze. In other words they are force grown. When it gets close to the time they are shipped around the world to you and I they are forced to flower. Big ugly bugs with teeth an inch long roam around the green house intimidating the orchids into flowering. That is a bald faced lie. The green houses manipulate the conditions under which the plants have been grown inducing them into inflorescence. Then they are shipped to us to kill. Capice?!

[lornaheath]

Aaawww Fank U Sausage.

I think you need to come over to Jolly Old England for a holiday and impart your knowledge.

Don't be bringing any of them there Big Buggers with the big teeth tho. Wouldn't like to meet one of em in the middle of the night.

Lorna
x x x

[james mickelso]

I don't think the Queen would relish me coming over. In fact I don't get out for a few more years.

[lornaheath]

Jeez you really banged up?

Course you ain't. Silly Sod.

Lorna
x x x

[james mickelso]

Well to tell the truth it's William. Well before the marriage his wife and I....well it's a long lurid tale of debauchery and drunken nights. But I'll let the Inquirer tell it.

[WhiteRabbit]

Many Phals will spike after getting some cooler night temps - or, others may say it's the day to night difference that is the trigger But fall-winter seems usual for many. My couple if Phals alway spike in late winter - early spring ...

[RosieC]

My experience is the same as Sonya indicated. Phals set spikes in the autumn/winter, or in a cold spell in spring or summer.

I've had quite a few start them during the cold spell earlier this year and they are growing the spikes now. Last year I had some start spikes over the summer in the cold spell then.

Absolute temp does not seem to matter, but a drop in temps seems to trigger them.

New ones can take 18 months to settle back down and start blooming again though. I think this is due to the way they are forced to flower for market, and it messes up their own patterns. Growers control temps to get them to flower whenever they want so they can have phals in the shops flowering all through the year.

[tucker85]

There are some summer blooming phals.. Most of them are the type with short flower spikes with species like bellina and violacea in the ancestry. But I find that most of my phals spike in the fall when we get the first cool weather, like Sonya and Rosie said. The flowers usually start opening in late winter or early spring, here in Florida. Most of them bloom for about 3-4 months. I have a few phals that continue to rebloom on old spikes for up to 6 months or even longer.

[RosieC]

You are right Tucker. I tend to forget those, most mass market ones are the longer stemmed ones that seem triggered by the cold. My bellina on the other hand is in bloom each summer. Currently a single flower, resting right down on the leaves.