Kingidium minus (also known as Phalaenopsis finleyi) - How do I pot that one up?

[u bada]

This is an old post, but wanted to see further input on this one...

katrina, your experience has been insightful... mine lost all it's leaves this last winter and most likely i attribute it to cold as i grow it outside. I got it from Andy and he said it can grow outside here in LA and handle down to 40's... it had 2 leaves when i got it last spring, so when it lost it i freaked... but the roots looked alive so just tucked it away and watered every once in a while. i was just at Andy's the other day and when i brought it up he simply pointed to his finleyi and they were all leafless, and sitting toward the bottom of the area of the outside are growing area (temps up to 90's low to 30's some years)... i'm guessing it'll pop into root growth once it's warmer, but we'll see... I have a phal thailandica that lost one of it's two leaves a couple months ago and no root growth... hoping it'll pump into gear soon also...

Don't know if Brooke is still around, but I have my doubts your plant is the species... looks oftly like a hybrid to me, the species leaves I've seen with research are all thinner more slender leaves...

any further insight would be appreciated...

[Brooke]

I'm still around and yes, my findleyi was the correct species as guaranteed by several AOS judges. I lost the plant pictured about three years ago when I had the flu. You will notice my plant got quite a bit of sun to turn the leaves a purple-ish color which will also make the leaves smaller.

I replaced it with another plant that has bloomed and the bloom is the same except the color isn't quite as dark. It is in spike now and I'm hoping the color improves. I still grow it in the same temperature parameters I gave in my original post.

Neither of my two plants have ever lost all of their leaves in the winter. I do have a lowii, wilsonii and braceana that do lose their leaves annually. The findleyi has not.

Brooke

[u bada]

Thanks brooke! Where's your location? and to be clear, you grow in a gh?

Well, hmmmm, guess I'll just keep it watered and hope it starts to resprout and grow roots... and once/ if it does I'll keep it watered and eventually move to an indoor location for winter...

how are you growing the wilsonii?

[Brooke]

I live in Kentucky so long winters with lots of ugly gray days.

The wilsonii grows about 2' from the findleyi but it is slightly more shaded.

Good luck with yours.

Brooke

[katrina]

I took Brooke's advice about watering through the winter this past season and the plant held onto it's leaves. I have the 3 leaves from last year and it's now growing a new leaf too. I added some extra moss and while I didn't give it as much water as I do in the summer...it got watered a good deal more. Temps were the same low of 58/60 and high into the 70's most days.

The one bummer thing is that it was very dry in the space this spring and while my little plant spiked and produced buds...they all blasted. We had a drier than normal spring and w/less rain outside and no humidity in the air combined w/lights that dry everything out...it was super dry in the space and I should've upped the watering even more but I didn't. When I say low humidity...I'm talking single digits many days! I assume it was the low humidity that caused the blasting problem...I had a few other phals that did the same thing. But, it held onto all it's leaves and the spike it still there so maybe it'll popped some more buds now that it's outside and in the rain/humidity.

[u bada]

Thanks to both of you for the insight!

wow, Katrina, thats like socal and southwest desert dry! Had no idea it can get like that in your neck of woods... makes me not feel as bad about over here...

[katrina]

Originally Posted by u bada

Thanks to both of you for the insight!

wow, Katrina, thats like socal and southwest desert dry! Had no idea it can get like that in your neck of woods... makes me not feel as bad about over here...

It can and does get that dry here in Oct/early Nov. I'd say October is probably our driest time of the year and w/the lights running...well...we walk around the house zapping each other from all the static electricity. Spring is usually a good deal more humid but we had lower than normal precip this year and, again, the lights really dry things out. I was happy if I saw day time humidity in the space in the low 30% range. In the winter I'm happy if I can keep the space in the low 40% range...furnace and lights = me lovingly referring to the space as the desert. If I were smart, I would grow only cacti as they do very well in my space. Plus, they'd require a good deal less watering.

Summers here are a mixed bag of dry and humid. The past 3 days have been so humid that it feels like a sauna. Some days it's so humid my mounts won't dry in 2 days and other times it's so dry and hot that the mounts are bone dry in under an hour. Welcome to central Ohio!

[u bada]

I grew up in OH, about an 1 hour north of columbus, city called Mansfield... Ohio countryside is beautiful, every time I'm back there I always marvel on the rolling green hills, forest thickets along the fields... but yeah have noticed the climate has been a bit erratic in recent years! (where isn't it...) I remember it generally been humid, especially in summer, don't even recall it being dry in fall, but probably wasn't on my mind as a teenager lol however i did grow orchids then albeit phals and catts...