Let's talk Botrytis! Who has experience with it??

[emmajs243]

Ok guys...I have recently recieved an order of Catts and I was givin the wonderful surprise of receiving them all in bloom or bud. Super exciting moment....that was extremely short lived....

Within a day or two one of the plants had small, pin point sized dots. Honestly, I didn't even notice them. They looked almost uniform so I didn't think twice but I did take photos of the blooms the night I recieved them so after the fact, I looked back and spotted what I believe to have been, the early signs of Botrytis.

The next day I was extremely busy so I didn't check on them until the followig evening (24+ hours later). By this point, multiple plant's blooms had either been completely wiped out or well on their way. Their stems and blooms had all turned nearly black with large pure black spots all over them. I knew it didn't look right, especially with how little time it took for such extreme damage to occur...

After some research, I've come to believe it is Botrytis. My problem?? What in the world can I do??! I really can't find too much about how to treat Botrytis and it is just wiping out one plants blooms at a time. The blooms themselves I'm not too concerned about. I wasn't expecting them to be in bloom so who am I to complain? BUT, I have read that Botrytis can move from blooms/buds/stems down to leaves and even pseudobulbs. Many of the plants have spots already on their leaves and yellowing...I can't be certain that these spots are due to Botrytis but of course, I am worried they might be due to how fast this is spreading through the plants

Let's just say.....Thank god that I isolated these guys! I guess just goes to show that you can never be entirely certain and that's why it's SO omportant to always isolate new plants no matter how recommended and respected the seller is.

From my research, I know Botrytis is a fungus with spores that can lie dormant for a very long time. Once colder and wet conditions occur, the spores can leave dormancy and start impacting a plant in less then a day....My guess is that the spores were present before being shipped and being in a cool box with little airflow moist conditions, that's when they became "active".

Lastly, I have read that once Botrytis occurs there is no "cure". Your only option is removing all infected tissue. Please correct me if any of this is wrong.

Does anyone have experience with Botrytis and treating Botrytis or how common it is for Botrytis to actually infect leaves and pseudobulbs? Also, does anyone have experience with disinfecting the remaining spores where the Botrytis I am partially trying to figure out how long of a road to recovery I am looking at for these guys...but also, what in the world to do....I hate to just start chopping off leaves and parts of a plant without being certain that's correct needless to say, certain that the spots on the leaves are actually due to Botrytis.

OH! AND! Thank you guys for helping! I am definitely out of my "comfort zone" or experience level on this one!


Ok photos added...ugh so many plants...so many photos to choose. I put photos of the first plant to be show signs because all the rest show some version of the same thing basically.

- Pic 1&2: are right after I unboxed my "patient 0". You can see the pinpoint spots on the lower petals? Sepals? You guys know what I mean! They are also on the actual petals but it's harder to spot with the red.

- Pic 3: same plant as pic 1&2....about 28 hours after unboxing and being in a room with slightly lower humidity and good air flow. (Everyone seemed a little too wet and some plants had white/grey mold so I figured I would try to speed up the "dry out" process...fans were on but not pointed at the plants. Only in the opposite direction.)

- Pic 4: Same plant as the first pics...72 hours after unboxing. By this point it had fully spread and infected every other plant.

- Pic 5: An example of the mold some of the plants came with.

- Pic 6-10: Different questionable spots all on different plant's leaves/greenery. Not positive yet what many of these spots are.

Sorry some photos are a tad blurry. I can take more tonight and replace them if needed. Also, the weird sizing/cropping is due to trying to crop the tag and sellers business info out....although I will not be ordering with them again, I don't want to offend anyone who has had good orders with them and don't want to harm their business if this is all just a strange, unforeseen, unordinary experience.