Jewel Orchids with Brown leaves

[Nish07]

Hi,

I recently purchased some Jewel Orchids (Macodes petola and Indra's Web.) I put these guys into a large tub and sealed it with a glass lid. The bottom of the tub had 1" expanded clay pellets with 1/4" water at the bottom. A couple began to grow quite well while a few others (which didn't look perfect to begin with) got worse. All started to get brown on some of their leaves while quite a few leaves were dying with holes in them. The temps in the room were 80 degrees daytime and 72 night. After a while I noticed a slug working its way around so I CO2 bombed the tub and let it sit for a day. After pulling the plants out of the pots to repot them I only found one other slug (both had died). I repotted the plants in new clean sphagnum (dry) in 3" net pots and dampened the sphag before placing them back into the tub.

Here are my questions:

1) Are the temps ok?

2) They're soaked with humidity in the tub. Is the humidity too much for them?

3) Would circulating air inside the tub be better for them

4) Could it just be the slugs causing the problems with the conditions mentioned above?

5) Would it help to use a dilute fertilizer on them and if so what kind, what dilution and how much/often?

Thanks,

-Nish

[CoolPhrog]

Hi Nish! Sorry to hear that you're having problems with your plants...I don't grow these but I did read that the temps and humidity you explained are within the range that these plants require. The slugs could have been the problem but I'm wondering if you were on to something when you mentioned the air circulation...strong air movement is what they like - also read that the roots don't like to be disturbed....

[Nish07]

Thanks,

I plan on adding a computer fan glued to the end of a pvc pipe into the tub. I'm hoping it helps as the leaves turning brown aren't looking too good and of course the leaves with holes are dying off.

The two that didn't develop the problem till recently are growing tall enough to hit the top of the tub and I'm wanting to propagate them so my conditions can't be that far off.

-Nish

Originally Posted by irphrog

Hi Nish! Sorry to hear that you're having problems with your plants...I don't grow these but I did read that the temps and humidity you explained are within the range that these plants require. The slugs could have been the problem but I'm wondering if you were on to something when you mentioned the air circulation...strong air movement is what they like - also read that the roots don't like to be disturbed....

[CoolPhrog]

No, I'd say your conditions are good with the exception of the air movement!

[Ross]

I have several Jewells in the bottom of my orchidarium. They get very low light (700-800 foot candles) high moisture (98%+), grow in fairly wet sphagnum, no fertilizer (well maybe an occasional application) and sit directly under 2 small PC fans. When I first got mine a couple years ago, they started the brown leaves thing. I left them alone to see what would happen and they acclimated quite well. I have 2 almost ready to bloom with multiple spikes.

[Judi]

Just to put in my , I have been growing jewel orchids for at least 8 years. They have multiplied beautifully and I gave away potfulls of them over the years. I grow them in clay pots in a mixture of commercial orchid mix and promix (soilless potting mix). They live on humidity trays and are mixed in with my other orchids on a stand under grow lights, I keep the mix moist but not wet--they go outside for the summer. This has worked well for me, the only problem I ever had was with some sort of mites or aphids that sucked on the stems of the plants--I don't think it was spider mites though. I nearly lost all the jewel orchids by the time I realized I had a bug problem. After way too many applications of Safer soap they are again thriving I now routinely spray them with Safer soap just in case I didn't get all the bugs. The bugs never spread to any of the other plants.