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Originally Posted by Katsols
That's plain amazing, how do they get the orchids to flower so numerously and cascade down like that. Does it happen with more mature orchids?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cattleya17
From what I understand you need a greenhouse. That's because in a greenhouse environment you cave complete control over the climate and they use this heating and cooling method or cooling and heating I can't remember.
Maturity is a factor as well, the plant with that huge spike is a pretty old looking plant.
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It's a combination of the two. It starts with perfect growing conditions. The growers keep them warm, with temps seldom below 80*F at night dipping a tad lower sometimes. This inhibits them from initiating spikes and makes them become super strong healthy mature plants. They do this for a few years. Then once they finally decide to let it spike, they dip the temps down to initiate them. Since the plants are now so large, mature, and have so much energy stored up, they put on a huge show, sending multiple spikes. Once the spikes grow and set buds and they grow to a certain size (I cannot remember the exact size though) they put the temperatures up again, to make the spikes keep growing longer. Once the spikes grow longer and get more buds, they repeat the warmth period. They do this multiple times, creating super long amazing spikes!
Hybrid Mode
