Den. nobile Gold Star 'Orange Royal'

[jess_hawk]

So, the local orchid club this week had "mystery plants" for raffle/door prize. I won a Den. Nobile Gold Star 'Orange Royal' - It has several new growths starting and I'm crossing my fingers that I don't kill it or anything! I'm thinking more and more that the fact that my other Den looks like its dying may have more to do with damage from falling over when I first got it than anything I'm actually doing wrong - it needs less water than I was giving it, but everything that has wilted was previously damaged except one leaf and a couple of flowers (but you can't expect those to last forever). Anyways, this one isn't so big and lopsided, so therefore not likely to fall over (the plastic pot the other one is in, is now inside a properly sized terra cotta pot that stabilizes it a lot).

I'm told bright light and fertilizer now (higher N in the spring, higher P in fall), with no water/fertilizer and cool temperatures in winter. Are the leaves supposed to die off? Or do they somehow miraculously survive this period?

Anybody got any more advice?
I'm a little confused on growth habit. Some of the photos I'm bringing up for Den. nobile seem to have upright stems, some have pendant ones... but this could be a variation caused by what part of the plant is shown and how it was photographed.

Thanks!

[quiltergal]

Hi Jess. Your Den is a very nice shade of mustardy yellow. It's a Yamamoto hybrid. OrchidWiz says it only needs a reduction in watering and no fert during the winter months. Cooler temps will set the buds. I have a couple of Yamamotos. I put them out in my detached quilting studio from Halloween until Valentines Day. They get watered once a month with plain water during that period. They sit in a west window, and them temps in the studio during the winter are in the low to mid 50s, sometimes cooler. The heat is only on when I'm working out there. The key is the combination of bright light and cool temps.