I'm still scared of killing all my plants. How do I get over it?
 

Hey everyone!

So, I've been growing orchids for a year and a half and I am still scared of killing my plants all the time! The only way I can deal with it is by pretending to myself that I am ambivalent when really I am not. I have about 25 plants now, and I am the most scared of killing my paph niveum hybrid and my dracula lotax seedling and so on.

Thoughts I have about killing orchids:

"OH MY GOD THIS VIDEO IS SHOWING GETTING WATER ON THE LEAF THE WHOLE PLANT WILL ROT TO DEATH IN 1 HOUR!!!"

and

"OH MY GOD THE PSEUDOBULB IS SLIGHTLY WRINKLED ALL THE ROOTS MUST BE DEAD!!"

and

"OH MY GOD MY PHALAENOPSIS ISN'T PUTTING OUT A NEW LEAF EVERY WEEK AND IT IS GROWING SEASON AND SO IT MUST BE DYING!!!"

and

"OH MY GOD IF I LET THIS WATER-NEEDY ORCHID DRY OUT FOR ONE DAY IT WILL JUST TURN YELLOW AND SHRIVEL UP LIKE A CUTE LITTLE GRANDMA!"

So guys, I am sure at least a few of you also panic about your plants. There's a reason we call them our "chids!!"

But what I am hoping you guys will do here is (1) commiserate with me or (2) give some sage wisdom as to how you overcame this orchid-terror. If I worry this much about plants just imagine if I had kids! haha

Any words? :biggrin:

Edit: Guys!! I have already killed 2 or 3, but I still stress out about it, haha

Kill one.

Kill it and get it over with hehe..

The best advice I've ever heard regarding this was the following from a grower and seller:

I can't tell you how to keep them alive, but I can surely tell you how to kill them. You know you are a true orchid grower when you've killed more than you can keep alive!

Know that they're far more resilient than you think. If you buy some that are more needy then expect the worse and hope for the best. Just think that if you do keep it alive AND bloom it you'll have reached a whole new level. If you kill it then you'll have already been expecting that so it won't be new.

On the plus side, losing an orchid means room for another. ;)

I've managed so far so keep more than I've killed but I've killed at least a dozen, half being mini Catts. None of those mini-Catts had bloomed yet so I was bummed I never got to know what they looked like; in that way I didn't know what I was missing out on for the better and the worse. The only plant I've REALLY cared about killing was my named (can't recall right now) yellow Phal. I dehydrated time and time again until finally the little plant couldn't take it. All the others who suffered the same fate survived. So now I slap my forehead every time I think about it and dream of another pure yellow Phal with a white center. In the meantime I'm worrying about plants I have that I've learned are difficult to care for. Of these Andy at Andy's orchids told me there's a lady who continues to kill and then re-buy the same plant. ;)

Goodness, just look at those comments. You see how heartless and jaded orchid growing will make you? :)

At some point, a plant will die on you. It probably won't even be your fault. You'll probably have a plant that came diseased or infected, and you'll watch it slowly (or quickly) fade before your eyes, despite your efforts. And that'll be your opportunity to realize that you can only do your best, and your best won't be enough to save every plant. But it will be enough to rebloom that one stubborn Paph, or to watch your first mounted Phal attach its newest roots, or coax a new growth out of some old, withered backbulbs. And that will definitely be enough.

And the best part is that the OB will be here to share your ups and downs, because many of us are going through the same crap! So good luck, and keep us posted!

Sometimes you just need to realize that they're still living and there's your proof!

I'm still worried about killing my plants since ive only been growing them for about 5 months.

got nearly 50 now but killed 10 more.

haven't killed any in a while ,the dead ones did help me learn how to take better care of my plants esp. seedlings of which ive about 25.

at least I learnt something from them and can alter my care according to my conditions, which I think is important for each grower as we all have unique growing areas.

I've kill about 10/30 orchids that I've owned so far...so yea. It's a good learning experience. Now I know how to keep em alive after I killed em.

It for sure goes away after you kill some 50+, than you do not even count anymore, and you are fine with it :-)

You could kill one, or you could just relax a bit. I have 3 kids, well they are grown kids, 29, 28 and 24. Believe me the orchids are just small stuff, grow them to enjoy not stress out over.

I don't really care if one of the cheap ones dies. Its good experience for when you move on to the expensive plants
:evil:

I've killed a few!!

Apparently not enough!

Growing orchids is supposed to be FUN. So, kill a few if you must we all have, then use the empty space to buy more :)

I agree... kill a few more. You clearly haven't killed enough.

My Ada Aurantiaca is going to die. At first I thought it was just a leaf tip issue. So, I cut off the leaf tips, disinfected everything... and for a while, it was fine. Then I found a rotted pbulb. Cut it. No sign of the evil purple ring. Figured, "Okay, must be ordinary aging." and for a while it was fine... now the whole plant is rotting from the roots up.

I don't have the conditions to grow this plant and I've tried and tried for six months to make it work... and it's just not thriving. I think repotting it to what I thought would be a better medium, is exactly what has done it in. I'm bummed, but I'm not freaking out.

I'm gonna buy a plant to replace it and move on. I have the pictures of the flowers though. It did bloom for me once. Just the once. I wish I could have kept it alive, but it's just not meant to be.

Astrid, I worry that I water too much, and all the roots will die...not that they'll shrivel up like a cute little grandma. I can see the shriveling, i can't see the roots dying :)
Oh...wow, there's a new saying for you to worry about.

What about: Wow, the plant is growing so well, I just KNOW there's rot underneath, I must unpot it and inspect it ?

Oh god that one is great!!
Hahaaaa! I absolutely know that feeling. I seriously wish I could unpot and repot my orchids like once a week because I worry so much about what lurks below. And I even grow my orchids in ALL clear pots! I can see their roots!! Oh I am just an anxious person haha

Since roughly half of my orchids are Phals, I get "oh no this non-Phal's roots are NOT GREEN, THEY MUST BE ROTTING. Never mind the fact that they're still light-colored and there's a crapload of them!"

I do understand the overwatering part and the clear pots. I'm using clear pots to try to get my hands around my new babies (paphs).
I actually worry like you...about under and mostly overwatering.

Edit:

Ok, you guys are awful, I look at beautiful photos and want things. I went and added a miltonopsis to an outstanding order.

I will now have to bear the weight of seeing crinkly leaves if I fail to water enough...and crinkly leaves for 2 or 3 years somewhat rend my soul. Now I must fear underwatering even more.

See what you've done?

I hate to lose an orchid, and was particularly despondent when I asked the grower what I was doing wrong and got yelled at for trying to grow "above my ability." Then I thought about the two loquats, two limes, the lemon, the grapefruit, the hibiscus, and who knows how many annual plants I managed to either kill or let die on my watch, either because I didn't know what I was doing, or because the conditions weren't just right. We try to do our best, and amazingly, we often succeed. Now I try to take the loss as a learning experience. If I can help an ailing orchid to pull through, that gives me something to use in the future. If I can't, I try to investigate what went wrong so I can watch for that in the future.

I like to think of it as paying for education. The same as taking a class.

I read and read and read about different culture needs when I first felt myself becoming interested in orchids - but no matter how much I read, I still needed the hands on experience for it to make sense.

There are days I still want to just be able to water them all at once, weekly. But that's not how this game works. I could've read that 5 million times and it wouldn't have sank in. Kill a plant you've had for quite some time because of the desire for ease? The lesson tends to stick a little more.

Keep learning, keep enjoying, keep growing.

I think most of us won't have any problems continuing to kill orchids, err grow orchids.

The bug to accquire more doesn't respond to many treatments and continues to reinfect us at intervals after spontaneous remission.

It is mostly about conditions and environment. Learn what genera grow best under your conditions, and stick with those in the beginning. As you become more adept at growing these plants, venture into other genera if you can adapt your conditions to their needs.

Most orchids are lost from water issues: too much or too little. If you suspect a problem, immediately tip the plant out of the pot and look at the roots. They will tell the story!

I have also found that sometimes crinkly leaves come no matter how much you water, and you can't risk rotting the roots. I, personally think that humidity is more important than watering as far as crinkly leaves go.

Yeah, you can read all the books and watch all the videos, but until you actually kill a few, you won't know how to grow orchids in YOUR environment. It's sort of like how you can watch someone play a piano, but you have to DO it before you can learn to play yourself.
Yesterday I was thinking about how many, many, many (and on and on, ad nausem.....) orchids came to my house and left as compost! And yes, it was troublesome and I have thrown SO MANY towels in the ring, it's not funny.
But, hey, I could have a drug habit - orchids keep me too poor to be able to be addicted to much of anything!
Keep trying, keep asking questions, keep reading, keep growing and keep learning from your past mistakes and successes. Eventually it will happen - and I would either not go back to that vendor or would let him know that I did not appreciate his "assistance".
All my best - !

I love thrift clothes shopping but I hate special wash instructions/dry clean only clothes. Sometimes I find a great outfit but the label says hand wash or dry clean only. If I like it enough I'll buy it anyway and put it through the regular wash with everything else. If it "dies" well then it just wasn't meant to be. If it survives, though, I am happily surprised and glad that I gave it the chance!

It sounds wrong in so many ways, but killing orchids one after another kind of desensitizes you to it after a while... eventually you find out enough of what you're doing wrong to fix the problems before they happen. :)

I try to fix problems before it's too late...but in some cases (let me give a recent one), you don't know you're overwatering the paphs till the roots are gone. And no, I didn't complete their destruction, I unpotted and saw I did bad and put them in a lighter mix...but I was operating on hunches, because everything on top looked good.
Being as it's now 20 days since I repotted and the leaves look like they're happier, I'm hoping that the two that had issues, are recovering.

I'm still scared of killing all my plants. How do I get over it?
 

I thought of this thread today when I read an article where an author for Orchids Magazine a few years back wrote about new orchid growers and the fears we all have when we first start growing orchids. The commentary made thus far pretty much summed up the 4 page article about the fears, overcoming them and not giving up while you learn the language of orchids. He said (paraphrasing here from memory) that it's like learning a foreign language. You can read and study all you want, but you learn the most from practice even though sometimes you might be embarrassed by learning what you said was wrong (or in this case what you did with an orchid was wrong). But it's all a learning process.

THIS. My grandmother has been growing orchids for over 50 years, and so she and my mother can agree with that quote!

I've been growing plants for over 40 years, I currently have about 1000 plants in my yard, I can easily say that I have killed more plants in my life then what's in my current collection.
I had an Angreacum that I grew from a seedling, it got big over the years and bloomed several times, it was a beauty. Then one day it started dropping leaves and within a few days it was dead, I still can't figure out that one, it still had good roots but the stem just turned to mush. I felt sad, but it found the trash can anyway.

Yeah, I am working on being able to throw things in the trash can, but I feel so guilty! Like I am throwing away a friend so unceremoniously!! Haha, oh well. I only have about 1.5 years' experience so far, and will learn quite a lot by the time I have 40 like you!

Omg these comments are too funny. But I totally understand how you feel.

I guess us newbies arent jaded enough yet.

You will also learn that if you neglect them, they'll thrive better half the time! It's so frustrating, LOL.

"We all love them to death!"
 

I’m still a newbie (6 months + of growing experience) and currently still stuck at the stage of MOURNING when one died on me (which I ALWAYS hold myself in part if not totally accountable for,) especially one of those hybrid varieties (read Noid) that came to this world by happy happenstance (meaning you don’t expect to run into another one like it). I mourn and mope as I do my daily rounds of taking care of the others, hang their pictures on the wall (metaphorically speaking,) etc.

The one remedy that has proved to work so far (but not indefinitely) is to get extravagant ala Henry the 8th (I have let go of one beauty therefore I must have another one even more luscious!) As a result I no longer care if my balcony runs out of space or the bathroom out of hooks as my orchid shopping has become more frequent of late. One “positive” outcome is I’ve also become bolder in my handling of the herd. I regard myself an “expert” when it comes to potting and mounting “techniques”, considering it a success if the plant doesn’t die too soon after being put through the experiment.

One valuable lesson I’ve learned, as some posts here have already mentioned: a little dose of NEGLECT now and then will make them chids happy as you wouldn’t believe. There soon will come a time when my collection reaches CRITICAL MASS then it'll be time for us to move to another bigger place, a house with a terrace maybe. Which reminds me of a French marquis once upon the time who lived in a castle. He only occupied one room though, after one season or two the room inevitably got piled with stuff to the ceiling, “I simply move to the next room," he said, "and let the servants take care of the rest.”

Once in our new “castle” the plants will have their own garden/terrace/pavilion or the likes, instead of sharing the balcony with the clothes drying business (folks don’t user dryers in this part of the world) or the bathroom with me as of present arrangement. They’ll be settled and content, and I can afford to give them as much benign neglect as their hearts desire!

Yup!! I've had prized plants die despite constant pampering, but 2-3 years ago I had a lot on my plate and my orchids got neglected for nearly a year. Surprisingly, I didn't lose many, and learned that even a Phal can survive a month without water and still be fine! :rofl: Most of the plants grew and bloomed pretty normally too. Ironically enough I lost a good part of my collection shortly after that period, when I was caring for them well but I got a bad infestation of mealybugs go through the collection...

But as others have said, once you've killed enough you a) learn from your mistakes and b) become desensitized to killing more orchids. In 10 years of orchid growing I must have killed at least 70... Now I only get upset if I kill one which I really loved and can't find a replacement (I have a list of 7-8 in that category, which even years after make me sad thinking about them).

Losing orchids was also more upsetting as a student, because I had spent hard earned money on them, and buying orchids was something of a luxury. Now I won't say I'm rich or anything, but I have a very decent salary, and if I kill an orchid I just think of the fact that it frees up space to buy more!! (unless I killed a favorite. Then I'm very sad, but still go buy more!!)

I had to laugh when I saw this thread (I just joined, so I've been scrolling through the list). I've only had orchids for less than a year, and I certainly wouldn't yet call myself a "grower" - I have houseplants, and now I have more orchids than anything else, and orchids are all I'm buying.

BUT I haven't managed to rebloom any plants, hopefully just because it's too soon.

AND I spend lots of time worrying about them: Oh no - there's a spot on a leaf! It must have an incurable virus!; Heavens, did I rinse that coconut husk enough, or will I wake up one day and find my oncidiums dead from the salts?? WHY CAN'T THEY GROW FASTER? Etc.

And when something good happens, like a new root or something, I'm ridiculously happy and make my partner look at the plants and listen to me talk about it. So yeah. All this is to say, I totally sympathize.

Welcome, Zabeta, fellow orchid fever sufferer, you have described us all, I think.

I must admit that I have not killed any orchid yet. (key word yet) But then again since I have retired I have no life and spend too much time watching my orchids. I do get upset if I lose a leaf or my plants have a setback. I might need therapy when I suffer my first loss though. :)