My 'chids just wanted to say "Hi!" :D

[tom_e_boi]

I'm still fairly new to the Orchid Board, and already introduced myself earlier this year. Well, after a dormant period of no orchids after moving to a new place, my addiction to orchids was once again rekindled after adopting two NoID Phals from my local SuperCenter. Since then, it's just like they follow me home now, lol. I now have a dozen of them, with no end in sight. The more of them I get, the more of them I want.
I've posted a couple of times already, one of those was about using Miracle Grow Orchid Potting Mix. My 'chids seemed to do okay in it, but after combing thru the threads on here, I decided to try the Better Gro Orchid Mix, and bought some of it from Lowes. I loved it so much that I went back and bought two more bags of it, to switch all of my Phals over to just one media. I even switched from the Miracle Grow orchid fertilizer, to the Better Grow brand, which has no urea in it. From what I've read on here, that's much better for them.
After adopting about half the 'chids that I have now, I bought them a cute little outdoor table to keep them together on, up and away from the ground. I began moving them outside during the days, while it was warm, before bringing them back in before it would get too cold. Then, when it finally warmed up enough, I moved them to my back porch. The table had another useful purpose, which is keeping the nighttime slugs off of them. Which has worked so far, tho I still make nighttime checkups just to be safe. Luckily, the slugs don't care much for any of my other plants in my backyard garden.
Ever since I moved them to their current location, my 'chids have absolutely loved it. Some that I thought were nearing the end of their blooming cycle have sent out even more buds from the growing tips of four of the five branches that are on its two spikes (the 5th branch had a broken tip, or it would've probably sent out more buds too...). My yellow Phal has branched out from almost all the lower nodes on both of it's two spikes, and even those branches are sending out branches. Others are showing signs of doing the same. They're all growing new leaves and I see roots growing as well. So I guess that I must be doing something right, lol.
They get some brief morning Sun, but throughout the rest of the day, they only get dappled light from the trees, and a little bit of afternoon Sun. I was watering them the usual once a week, but once it warmed up, I now water them about every other evening. I water them just before the Sun sets, so that they have time to dry off before it gets dark. That way the roots are nice and damp, but not wet. At night, there's a constant, but gentle, breeze blowing over them all night long.
I checkup on them daily, well, multiple times throughout the day actually. Now that it stays in the mid-80's during the day, and low-60's through the night, my Phals seem to grow just a little bit more overnight. It never gets old watching them grow, HaHa.
Oh, I did find a good use for the Miracle Grow orchid potting mix. I used it for my Anthuriums. They grow in the same conditions as orchids do, and I see that my anthuriums actually love the Miracle Grow mix as a media. They've also taken off blooming and growing more leaves and roots.
My neighbor was passing thru my backyard walking her dog as I was watering my plants. She kept telling me that I had the most beautiful plants in the whole neighborhood.
It is nice to know that others around here enjoy my little backyard garden/wildlife sanctuary. When I first moved here, I noticed a hummingbird flying around my bright red Anthurium, and went out and bought a hummingbird feeder. After that, my house was bombarded with hummingbirds, lol! I had to buy more feeders for both front and back, and they still fight over them. Sometimes, I'll be outside and they're so busy fighting over the feeders, that I feel like they're going to fly right into me, HaHa! I tried counting them once, but they move too fast. At the peak, I was having to refill the feeders twice a day. My neighbors have seen all the action that was going on and now my whole neighborhood has hummingbird feeders everywhere.
Since moving here, I have seen squirrels, deer, rabbits, several different butterflies (that love my Oriental Hybrid Lilies...), woodpeckers, bluejays, bluebirds, finches, cardinals, and many other birds.
Well, I've rambled on long enough for now, so if you'll excuse me, my backyard habitat is calling me...

[bellini girl]

That's some backyard habitat..Nice place to retreat. Good variety, orchids, tropicals and the birds..Nice touch

[Olivia]

That's incredible! I thought (male) hummingbirds were too territorial to have that many on a feeder at once?

[lostonthebeach]

Great story and wonderful looking plants.

[Bud]

Welcome and Hello !
Lovely flowers.
I wish I had a backyard...

[RosieC]

Welcome back to Orchid Board, sounds like you've got really bitten by the orchid bug now

[tom_e_boi]

I've recently purchased a white NoID Dendrobium Phalaenopsis on eBay. I've dabbled with them in the past, so I'm pretty familiar with them. It isn't what I had questions about, well not entirely. Back when I bought it, my order had slipped thru the cracks, and the seller had overlooked it. When nothing arrived in the mail, I contacted them and they found the order and shipped it out the next day. Well, for being patient, they also threw in a few extra Epidendrums free of charge.
They are what I had questions about. I've never grown them before. From what I've gathered, I think that they're fairly easy to grow. I just wanted to seek out advice from others who are more familiar with them than I am.
I received my order a couple days ago from Spain, lol. I didn't know the seller was from Europe until after I placed the bid, which wasn't much. Just about $5 dollars, plus S/H. I let them soak for a bit before potting them up. The Dendrobium Phal had only one cane with a new shoot growing out from it. The cane was pretty big and healthy with several healthy leaves. But the new growth's tip had rotted and the plant didn't have many roots. I cut it back to just the healthy tissue and sealed the cut with cinnamon. It seems to be doing okay, and I'm fairly confident it'll bounce back and start growing again.
The three Epidendrums all looked like they were keikis, two had some roots and new growth budding out from them, and the third had no roots but looks like some are fixing to grow. My question would be how do I encourage new root growth for the Den. Phal and the Epidendrums? Plus, does anybody have any advice on what conditions they will need? I think they're the reed stem kind, but not certain. I'll take some pix of them today and post them on here, if that'll help any.

I do have a couple of other pix that I also wanted to share. One is of my yellow NoID Phal, which has over two dozen blooms on it, with more on the way. Both spikes have branched out from every node except the two closest to the base of the plant. Plus, those branches have sent out more branches, but they seem to have stalled for the time being. I'm guessing they're just biding their time and just waiting for the current blooms to finish up before branching out.
The second pic is just soo adorable. I have a squirrel feeder mounted on one of the trees in my backyard, which the squirrels happily raid every morning, lol. Well, one day I was out back watering my plants and noticed something odd about the box. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that a tiny squirrel was completely inside of it just eating away, HaHa! Most of the squirrels are too big and have to eat with their butts hanging out of the feeder (like the one in the 1st pix I posted in this thread). Well, this little squirrel just ignored me and let me get real close to take pix of him. He has since been back several times now, and climbs completely into the feeder each time, lol. He was just too darn cute that I had share with everybody...

One last thing that I forgot to mention was another time I was out back, I seen a cute bumble bee flying around my Phals, going to each and every flower on them. I wasn't able to get pix of it, but I thought it was neat seeing the bee trying to pollinate my flowers, HeHe. It wasn't successful, but it was still pretty cool.