Repotted my first phal - debriefing

[Fuzzy]

Dear Forum,

You have been tremendously helpful with all my newbie questions. I took your advice and repotted my phal in full bloom. Hopefully I did more good than harm! The moss it was in was VERY old! See the first two pictures of the old medium and the unpotted plant from last week. So, I ordered a new dual oxygen pot and some fresh phal medium mix of moss, perlite, charcoal and bark, watched some repotting videos and went ahead with it. I rinsed the new medium, unpotted the plant and removed all the old moss. The third picture is showing the roots - quite a few good ones, quite a few rotten ones. Then I started clipping away the bad ones. This was the hardest part for me, making the judgment call which ones should stay and which ones should go. I took off a couple of roots that were rotten in the middle but had healthy ends. Did I do the right thing? The fourth picture shows what the roots looked like after I was done. The orange color is cinnamon - I sprinkled the roots generously. Some of the roots looked dark, but were firm and plump, so I kept those. They are the ones that were on the outside before and they look grey when not wet. So, into the new pot it went. I tried not to pack the new medium too tightly. I used surprisingly little medium at the end of the day, hope that was the right decision. The fifth picture is showing the orchid in its new home. The last picture is not the best quality, but you can see that the phal is in full bloom (and a glimpse of my view of Manhattan).

So - how did I do? Please give me your honest input because I'm trying to learn from this experience as much as possible.

[RandomGemini]

No cinnamon on roots. Cinnamon is for leaves, not roots. I would remove it from the pot and rinse the cinnamon off ASAP. Cinnamon is a desiccant. It will prevent your roots from absorbing moisture.

All you had to do was cut back to healthy tissue. It's not necessary to remove an entire root, just the rotted part.

Otherwise, it looks like you did just fine.

[Leafmite]

I tried the cinnamon on the roots thing once...yes, rinse that cinnamon off right away! :0

---------- Post added at 02:13 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:09 PM ----------

It looks good otherwise.

[Fuzzy]

Oh, no! I read on multiple websites that cinnamon is a fungicide and GOOD for cut roots to help them heal faster! How could they all be so wrong? Wow, I loathe to unpot the poor this yet another time.

As for cutting off entire roots, unfortunately a few of them were rotting at the very top and ok at the bottom. Some were broken in multiple places, but otherwise firm. Should I have kept those?

[Leafmite]

Usually you do keep those roots but your orchid will grow new ones so it doesn't really matter too much.
I read the same thing about cinnamon many years ago and used it on the roots of a rescue orchid (a cattleya). I seem to learn everything the difficult way. :|

[leslieann79]

I wouldn't keep the roots with rotted middles. I mean if the middle is rotted you are going to lose the good root at the bottom of it anyway. If a root is good at the top, rotted in the middle, and good at the bottom cut where the rot starts and move on.

[rvalkenburg]

You can use cinnamon on roots that you cut back but you must gently swab the cut ends and make sure you don't get it on the rest of the root/roots. If you sprinkled it on the roots, I would take it out and not just rinse it but soak the entire root base in a pot for about 10-15 minutes.

[Tatobe]

My 5 cents: I wouldn't keep the smaller pot enclosed in the transparent pot when there is no air movement around the inside pot. There must be same space in-between.


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[LovePhals]

I would replace the medium that has cinnamon in it again as well and definitely rinse that off the roots it will dry them up. Better to do that then have all your roots die. Looks to me like I would not have cut off that much root, but it will grow new ones.

[ramonypony]

Your phal's in pretty rough shape but I think it can bounce back. Cinnamon can be used on cut spikes, cuts made to diseased leaves and on the tips of cut roots to prevent infection. It dries up the open tissue and keeps pathogens away. I no longer use any cinnamon on my phals roots, I only use hydrogen peroxide. It oxygenates the roots and kills pests. If a phal is really pathetic I will soak all the roots in straight 3% peroxide for 10 minutes or so, otherwise I will just spritz the roots with it and lay it out to fizzle while I prepare the pot/medium. I've had a lot of success with it.

Honestly, I would re-repot this guy because you put a lottt of cinnamon on the roots! I would rinse them off and give it a peroxide bath because it looks like the roots are very oxygen deprived. You could probably just rinse the medium well and still use it, or play it safe and use new mix. After repotting what I do is water well immediately and then let it get completely dry before watering thoroughly again. You can spritz the top of the medium around the base of the plant with water to encourage new root growth. But watch that you don't get any in the crown! You should see new root growth in a few weeks. But since this phal has an unhealthy root system and is heavily laden with flowers you may need to cut the spike prematurely to get it to focus on growing new roots.