My baby is sick, please help!

[angel143]

Hi everyone,

I'm currently in quite the predicament. We've recently had a week long period of cloudiness and dampness. I hadn't realized at the time just how susceptible orchids are to fungal infections (I'm a newbie, this is my first baby )

Anyway, I recently surveyed my orchid to see if there were any problems, and this is what i found. I've attached the image of the leaf that I have since removed. It was yellowing and drying off long before the black spots appeared. I apologize in advance for the lacking quality, someone else has my camera at the moment. I just wanted to capture the image for reference purposes.

This is my situation, in my neighbourhood (and all the neighbouring cities for that matter) make it ILLEGAL to have chemical pesticide/insecticide/fungicide. This means that I have no means to purchase Physan 20 or Bayer's 3-in-1. I am currently using "Garden Sulphur Fungicide Miticide", applying a thick paste wherever I see black dots on my baby. I've also sprayed the leaf with same and cut off the flower stem to try and get the plant to focus on getting better. I'm planning to repot it tomorrow, onto new media. I've since placed in a much better ventilated area, turning on all the fans available in my place.

Here is my question, would a topical application of the garden sulphur be enough to combat this infection? If not, is there anything I can use as a systematic treatment to remove the fungus? Again, I have no means to purchase insecticides, and so would have to be able to find the product on a different aisle. Currently, the small black spots are on the actual stalk of the plant, as well as slowly starting to grow out to one leaf so far

I'm currently debating mixing just a tad garden sulfur to the potting mix, but decided against it because it didn't sound too good.


PLEASE, PLEASE HELP! Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated.

[nenella]

Hi, It would help If you showed a photo of the whole plant as it is. An explanation is if this is a bottom leaf & that it has dried up naturally & as you kept it on the plant it probably got wet & did not dry up fast enough & therefore got the black spots on it ??

[seamonkey]

To me, that looks like badness. Do any of the center leaves have the spots? How are the roots?

[Ray]

If that's a lower leaf, my view would be that the plant was naturally resorbing the water and nutrients from that leaf before dropping it, and the fungus grew on the failing leaf - perfectly normal and nothing to be concerned about.

If it's on an upper leaf, or is occurring on several at once, it's a whole different story.