Orchid disease

[TheAMP]

A friend who is moving gave me this orchid today. It does not look good. I would be interested in knowing what has infected the plant and hope someone can identify the problem. If so, can the plant be saved? Thanks

[Ray]

Biosduval scale, or mealie bugs.

[malteseproverb]

Looks like scale... this is a really intense infestation. I would throw it out. And wash your hands thoroughly before touching your other plants. I don't think it can be saved; it's way more likely the scale will get all your other plants too. I've been battling a scale infestation for months and my worst affected plant looked nowhere near that bad.

[rbarata]

1 - Isolate the plant in a non-windy location.

2 - Prepare a solution of water and 1~2% alcohol and spray the roots.

3 - Unpot it, trash the old medium and spray the pot (or get a new one). Wash it.

4 - Spray the roots. Let it be for 10 min and then wash it.

5 - Repot with fresh medium.

6 - Spray with imacloprid, the plant and the top of the medium. Water it lightly after that.

7 - Spray again weekly for 3 weeks.

8 - Have faith and think "While there's green, there's hope!"

9 - If it dies, at least you had a very good learning experience.

[estación seca]

All the above advice is reasonable. The most important points are that this can very easily spread to other plants, and it is hard to eradicate.

It will be quite a while before this plant blooms again, even if it survives. You have to decide whether you want to spend a lot of time nursing a near-dead plant that may infest your whole collection.

If you throw it out, first put it in a plastic bag, spray with rubbing alcohol and seal the bag. The bugs can crawl out of your trash can and spread.

If you've already put this plant near other ones, you need to treat them as well.

Another treatment option is to drown the bugs. First, remove the plant from the container and get rid of all the medium in a sealed plastic bag. I would treat the medium with alcohol, too.

With an infestation this heavy, I would next douse the entire plant with rubbing alcohol straight from the bottle, and let it dry away from other plants. Then, run water over it at the sink, and use a small, soft brush, to remove as many dead bugs as possible.

Then, submerge the entire plant in a container large enough for all the leaves and roots to be under water. Use water with a little dish soap added to break the surface tension. It should form just a few bubbles, not a rich soothing lather. Not dishwashing machine soap, sink soap. Soak it for 12 hours. You will probably need something to weight it down so it stays under the surface.

Remove, rinse off the dead bugs, and pot up into new medium.

[mexicowpants]

Yup, hardcore scale infestation. Most important first step, as recommended by rbarata, is keep it WELL away from all your other plants, orchids or otherwise.

For the scale infestation I had, I found alcohol and soap remedies to be pretty damn useless as a control, although they do temporarily help with the aesthetics.

For eradication, a systemic pesticide such as Imidacloprid is your best bet. Use the dilution recommended for ornamentals. You'll need to spray the affected plant(s) once a week for a minimum of a month, making sure to thoroughly wet the media, too (rbarata's suggestion of a change of media and pot is also a good idea, although for me it wasn't possible, due to around a hundred plants being affected.) Make sure the plant stays dry for at least 24 hours after treating.

The treatment should be continued for at least 2 weeks after the last sighting of live scale/bugs to ensure all eggs have been eradicated, too.

Good luck!

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