Help! Something has spread to most of collection

[tucker85]

Most of the damage looks like sunburn to me. It may not be that the light is too bright but simply that the orchids weren't accustomed to that level of light. I would definitely decrease the light level for now.

[gcc0008]

Thanks for all the info. There is water on the leaves in the pictures because I just got done spraying them when the pictures were taken. They are on a north facing porch and don't receive any direct sunlight so I didn't think the light was a problem, however several of them I purchased bagged from lowes at the end of the summer and I could tell they had been on the shelf a while and getting hardly any light at all. So maybe even the little light they were getting was too much too soon. Just to give an idea of the amount of light, about a month ago I used a light meter in the spot of the plants and never got a reading over 200fc. And I know clouds and over variable come into play but I had read that some of these orchids need light of 2000fc. Is this true?

If some of it may be rot shouldn't I cut off those parts of the plant? I will start immediately treating for spider mites. If if can sometimes take months to treat the mites and I need to bring them in for winter, is there any way they could move to the carpet in my house or other places and make a permanent residence?

And I am committed to trying to save them.

Thanks,