I'm going on hiatus.

[Angurek]

I decided that I'm going to put the orchid growing hobby on hiatus until further notice.

I'm doing this because I've lost about 75% of my collection to a nasty erwinia (and fungal) outbreak that I haven't been able to control. I have a reason to believe that this is a super bug - no remedies work. I've tried everything from cinnamon to listerine to big guns like Phyton 27, and nothing works. It always starts the same way - little brown blotches appear near the crowns of the plants, on new leads, that spread and eventually cause the growth to damp off. The infection then spreads to the rest of the plant, and I end up with a leafless stump.

It would be useless to add any more plants to my collection at this point because they'd get infected in a matter of weeks. Because my space is confined, the infections spread rapidly. I had perfectly healthy plants that were disease-free one day, and then losing leaves the next.

Of the 36 or so orchids that I originally had, only 9 healthy plants remain. The rest are either dead, diseased, or beginning to show signs of necrosis.

You have no idea how much it sucks to have to trash your favorite plants, or how frustrating it is to have spent hundreds of dollars on plants that ended up dying untimely deaths. I also can't explain the feeling of hopelessness that I get when I find a newly infected plant, because I know it's only a matter of time until it succumbs.

I still can't figure out how this disease got into my collection, since I'm very careful not to pick up diseased plants. Either way, I won't be buying orchids for at least a year or two until I can completely sanitize my growing area. I'm thinking about giving my healthy plants to someone who will take good care of them, but I'm not sure if I should or not, since I don't want to pass this godforsaken disease to another grower.

Oh, well. The hobby was fun while it lasted, and I've met some awesome people because of it. Unfortunately, this is where I say "no more," at least until I find a concrete solution. I guess the only way I'll be able to enjoy orchids now is by looking at pictures of them. If I can't grow healthy plants, I'll enjoy looking at other people's plants.