Project 2016: Cattleya walkeriana

[gngrhill]

The one that was mounted is the one that died. the other was bare root when I got it and I potted it in a small plastic pot. It has a tiny new growth started, but just does not look thrifty.
ES, days are around 70 F right now until it gets warmer outside. Heater is set at 70. I will move it under the lights

[Leafmite]

Originally Posted by gngrhill

The one that was mounted is the one that died. the other was bare root when I got it and I potted it in a small plastic pot. It has a tiny new growth started, but just does not look thrifty.
ES, days are around 70 F right now until it gets warmer outside. Heater is set at 70. I will move it under the lights

Good luck gngrhill! I lost one this past winter (it was the bag baby from Lowes). I plan to look for another one (and buy it before they are half-dead!).

[gngrhill]

Originally Posted by Leafmite

Good luck gngrhill! I lost one this past winter (it was the bag baby from Lowes). I plan to look for another one (and buy it before they are half-dead!).

I don't know if I want to try again . Apparently I don't have the right conditions or I'm doing something wrong.
It's kind of up the same alley as my mini purple which I know you have had good luck with. I've had mine for three years now and it is also struggling. New growth, but leaves look stressed and doesn't look like it wants to bloom any time soon. I am apparently missing something with these little Catts.

[estación seca]

Originally Posted by gngrhill

...the other was bare root when I got it and I potted it in a small plastic pot. It has a tiny new growth started, but just does not look thrifty.
ES, days are around 70 F right now until it gets warmer outside. Heater is set at 70. I will move it under the lights....

...I don't know if I want to try again . Apparently I don't have the right conditions or I'm doing something wrong.
It's kind of up the same alley as my mini purple which I know you have had good luck with. I've had mine for three years now and it is also struggling. New growth, but leaves look stressed and doesn't look like it wants to bloom any time soon. I am apparently missing something with these little Catts.

I wish you could go experience what their habitat is like. That really helps understanding what they like. I was in C. nobilior habitat in the winter without knowing it at the time - I was there to see cacti and succulents.

In their winter the trees they grow on drop their leaves. They get a lot more sun in the winter than in the summer. Their winter nights might be near 60 F / 15.5C, but days are a lot warmer - usually into the 80s F / 26-32C, and most winter days are cloudless.

Your 70 F / 21C - by - day - for - weeks - on - end - winter is pushing it. Yes, home growers keep them alive like that, but it isn't ideal. These are warm-growing orchids. Again, people will write to say theirs do OK on the windowsill in the winter, but 70 F is not keeping them happy - just alive. Any additional insult can push them over the edge, even something a healthy and happy plant would tolerate without problems.

The take home would be, can you put some of your warm-growing orchids onto a heating mat for the winter? And I would put C. walkeriana into the brightest winter spot you have.

In the summer they get rained on almost every day. It is very hot, often 120 F / 49C or higher! It is suffocatingly humid. It does not cool down much at night. They grow in bright shade under tree canopies. The climate is like New Orleans in the summer, but even hotter.

Although they get wet all the time, their roots are on branches, so they are exposed to the air.

Go back to read what catwalker wrote here on Orchid Board about C. walkeriana. (Think about that username and where it came from?) Almost everybody with a problem got told to water more during the summer.

If it's in a pot, and the insides stay soggy wet, this is a real problem. This is why people like to grow them mounted, or a basket with no or next to no medium. But then you really do have to water every day.

I goofed up with my C. walkeriana coerulea this winter. The photo of the plant when it was happy is here.

It had dozens of growths in a 3" / 8cm pot. I intended to mount it last fall but didn't get around to it. I was super busy at work one warm week and didn't water it enough. Then it got relatively cold here. The plant began dying back pseudobulb by pseudobulb during cold weather. I didn't want to water it much, and it kept shriveling. I watered during a warmer spell and it died back even more. I decided what I was doing was killing it, so I went to mount it. We had had a few nice warm days and the sunroom was up into the 80s F. I saw a small growth making new roots.

I took the plant apart. There was one tiny pseudobulb left alive out of those dozens. I mounted it onto a piece of mesquite with some sphagnum moss as a pad. I would not have used the sphagnum with a healthy larger plant; they don't grow into moss in habitat. But I have to work, and I can't always water when I want to.

We've been warm for a while, and my sunroom has had 40%-50% humidity. That tiny pseudobulb is already putting out two new growths. I think there's a good chance it's going to survive.

The moral: LOTS of water during warm weather; warm winters; not much water when it's cool; mounting really is better than in a pot for many people.

My other C. walkeriana in S/H is doing well. I've read people have had trouble with them in S/H. I'm guessing it's not enough warmth.

Now that I look at the photo of my plant on a mount, the undersides of the leaves appear to have spider mite damage. This is an artifact from a cheap phone camera. Those blemishes are permanent wrinkling from leaves that got too dry for too long, not spider mite damage.

[gngrhill]

Thank you ES, for your excellent info. My humidity is running 70 percent since I changed my humidifier filters . I changed my heater settings to 72F days and 62F nights. I know that's not much of a change, but it's the best I can do because I have cool growers in the same room. I can put it on a heat mat, and I did move it under the t-5s and I can raise it up closer to the lights. Maybe they will perk up when the weather gets warmer.

[isurus79]

Originally Posted by estación seca

I wish you could go experience what their habitat is like. That really helps understanding what they like. I was in C. nobilior habitat in the winter without knowing it at the time - I was there to see cacti and succulents.

In their winter the trees they grow on drop their leaves. They get a lot more sun in the winter than in the summer. Their winter nights might be near 60 F / 15.5C, but days are a lot warmer - usually into the 80s F / 26-32C, and most winter days are cloudless.

Your 70 F / 21C - by - day - for - weeks - on - end - winter is pushing it. Yes, home growers keep them alive like that, but it isn't ideal. These are warm-growing orchids. Again, people will write to say theirs do OK on the windowsill in the winter, but 70 F is not keeping them happy - just alive. Any additional insult can push them over the edge, even something a healthy and happy plant would tolerate without problems.

The take home would be, can you put some of your warm-growing orchids onto a heating mat for the winter? And I would put C. walkeriana into the brightest winter spot you have.

In the summer they get rained on almost every day. It is very hot, often 120 F / 49C or higher! It is suffocatingly humid. It does not cool down much at night. They grow in bright shade under tree canopies. The climate is like New Orleans in the summer, but even hotter.

Although they get wet all the time, their roots are on branches, so they are exposed to the air.

Go back to read what catwalker wrote here on Orchid Board about C. walkeriana. (Think about that username and where it came from?) Almost everybody with a problem got told to water more during the summer.

If it's in a pot, and the insides stay soggy wet, this is a real problem. This is why people like to grow them mounted, or a basket with no or next to no medium. But then you really do have to water every day.

I goofed up with my C. walkeriana coerulea this winter. The photo of the plant when it was happy is here.

It had dozens of growths in a 3" / 8cm pot. I intended to mount it last fall but didn't get around to it. I was super busy at work one warm week and didn't water it enough. Then it got relatively cold here. The plant began dying back pseudobulb by pseudobulb during cold weather. I didn't want to water it much, and it kept shriveling. I watered during a warmer spell and it died back even more. I decided what I was doing was killing it, so I went to mount it. We had had a few nice warm days and the sunroom was up into the 80s F. I saw a small growth making new roots.

I took the plant apart. There was one tiny pseudobulb left alive out of those dozens. I mounted it onto a piece of mesquite with some sphagnum moss as a pad. I would not have used the sphagnum with a healthy larger plant; they don't grow into moss in habitat. But I have to work, and I can't always water when I want to.

We've been warm for a while, and my sunroom has had 40%-50% humidity. That tiny pseudobulb is already putting out two new growths. I think there's a good chance it's going to survive.

The moral: LOTS of water during warm weather; warm winters; not much water when it's cool; mounting really is better than in a pot for many people.

My other C. walkeriana in S/H is doing well. I've read people have had trouble with them in S/H. I'm guessing it's not enough warmth.

Now that I look at the photo of my plant on a mount, the undersides of the leaves appear to have spider mite damage. This is an artifact from a cheap phone camera. Those blemishes are permanent wrinkling from leaves that got too dry for too long, not spider mite damage.

I do want to mention that C. nobilior comes from a hotter and drier part of South America than does C. walkeriana. Harry told me that C. walkeriana is ok in cool (below 50F) winter weather if it stays dry. I believe he even mentioned they can handle near freezing temps, but they must be bone dry!

---------- Post added at 12:31 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:19 PM ----------

This last post made me go back to read through Harry's posts. Not sure if these have already been posted in one of the previous 44 pages () of discussion in this thread!!

Here is one about general growing tips: C walkeriana - Tips for Growing & Blooming

Some walkeriana vs. nobilior discussion: cultural help for C. nobilior

[Leafmite]

I think we posted the Cattleya tips but it doesn't hurt at all to post them again since they are probably long lost.... Thanks!

[Subrosa]

I haven't posted pics of my bag baby 'Carmela' in a while and things are definitely happening with it. My first inclination is that these are all new growths, but my recent experience with my nobilior has left me wise enough to reserve judgement for the time being!

[Optimist]

Update: Well, I got my Walkeriana on 5/16/16 and now it is 8/7/17 so I thought I would give an update. The temperatures are in the 80s and 90s, sometimes the 70s with cloud cover. (In the winter I can leave them out for quite some time, in November or so they come in and are treated as windowsill plants). The nights are cooler. Rain now about every third day. Rain is usually in the evening. I elected to use lecca in a net pot, with a top dressing of bark. I water about 3 times a week (if no rain) with a fine mist from a mister I set up. It is kept in a hanging basket in a shade house outside (the shade now is from a tree because I took the shade cloth off the beginning of August when it gets cooler). The bulbs are plump and the roots are growing really well. I think it is still several years until blooming. I got a walkeriana X percivaliana as well. It is also doing well.

Anyway, here is the Walkeriana semi-alba.


Big plump bulb. They are all like that! Even the oldest is not very puckered.


Size, a regular AA battery for size comparison

[wintergirl]

Good job Optimist. Here is my update. Remember how I had trouble with my SVO plant and I mounted it with another c walkeriana? Well here they are. They both have new growth but as you can see the SVO plant still looks crappy.

DSCN2181.jpg

DSCN2179.jpg