dendrobium won't bloom, and not sure why....

[imgliniel]

Hello all, Fist let me say HI! I am new this place looks awesome and I am hoping that someone can help me.

I have a dendrobium that won't bloom and I am not sure why. I am not sure if it is just not the season for it to bloom yet or if I am doing something wrong?

Details, It is potted in bark chips, placed in a south facing window that has a somewhat eastern exposure. It get bright indirect light all day and in the morning it gets some slivers of dappled direct light, maybe an hours worth. It gets watered thoroughly once a week (I let the faucet run to flush out any disolved salts etc), and ussually gets close to dry but not completely dry between waerings. It is in a bathroom where I take my nightly shower (and I take long showers) so it gets a fair does of humidity.

It seems to be happy and healthy other then the lack of flowers. It pushed a bunch of new roots this spring and a second cane wich appears to be robust and doing well. It is almost as big as the first one now. It did not lose any leaves over the winter so I am fairly certain it is an evergreen type. But unfortunately when I bout it there was no cultivar/species tag so I don't know what it is. The flowers it had when I got it were wery round and wide compared to the pics of alot of dendi's I'v seen so I think it migh be a dendi/phal. I only know it is a dendrobium because at one point I saw a bouquet of flowers with the same blossom shape (that weird little backfacing spike) labeled as such.

It's neighbor, my pink and white phal is putting on a beautiful display of over 20 flowers and has been blooming strong since at least february, so I am not sure what is up with the dendi Being new to Orchids (these 2 are my first successes, my first orchid was a phal and I sunburned it, sad day) I am not sure what I am doing wrong.

Any ideas? (yes I can take pictures if that will help anyone).

thanks!
Imgliniel

[Orchidreamer]

A common reason why dens don't bloom is that they're not receiving enough sunlight. Dens require a lot more light than phals, so the amount of light to bloom a phal is much less than the amount of light to bloom a den. I grow mine indoors where it gets lots of afternoon sun (when you're first trying this, watch for sunburn in the beginning).

[camille1585]

It also depends if you have a phal type or a nobile type den. That it kept it leaves doesn't mean anything since even the nobiles will keep leaves if they don't get a proper winter rest. When you got it I assume it was in bloom. Do you remember if the blooms were coming from a stem at the top of each cane (phal type), or if the blooms were appearing directly down the side of the cane(nobile type)?

Once we know what it is it's easier to help you since each type needs different care in order to bloom.

[imgliniel]

ok, when it was originally in bloom it had 2 spikes, one was coming directly out of the top, and one was coming out from between 2 leaves about halfway down. But it had long stems with flowers along the stems, they were not directly along the cane.



I tried to attach two pictures, hope they show up. This is a pic I found not my actual orchid but it looks EXACTLY like this one. the flowers are the same even down to color. Of course this one has more canes then mine, but other then that they are pretty much identical

[Call_Me_Bob]

im not sure, but im interested in the answer

[camille1585]

It's a phal type, so the care you've been giving it fine. How long ago did it last bloom? Hopefully once you're new cane matures it will bloom. I'm not positive, but I think these guys only bloom once per cane, so you have to wait for the new growths to be ready to get more blooms. But I'm not sure. Light sounds fine, but just to double check, how far away from the window is it? Southeastern exposure is good, but it depends how close you have it.

[imgliniel]

less then 2 feet from the window, hang on I'll try and put another picture up, but they are not going to be great because I only have my cell phone at the moment, lol.

[imgliniel]

ok, actual pic of mine lol. one is a shot of all the plants residing there, the window is in the corner on the right so you get an idea how close they are. One is a pic of just my dendrobium so you can see the new cane it is the one on the right. And one just because it is pretty are the flowers on the phal.

[WhiteRabbit]

It may need more light - my indoors orchids all are on the windowsills.

[bdelfiero]

I agree with white rabbit, give more light to your dendro. I grow mine outside and it gets full morning sun until 11 am and filtered direct sun for the rest of the day and they love it.