Help me save my Phal
 

Ok, before I knew better, I nearly killed 4 Phals. Not only did I over water, they were in pots with no holes on the bottom...

However, about 6 months ago I immersed myself in Orchid books and have built up my knowledge and even bought myself a new collection which I take much better care of now.

Those four I spoke of were repotted back then (about 6 months ago) and I've been taking good care of them since. I only water them once a week or when the medium bark mixture it almost dry. They get a very good amount of light, in fact you can see the leaves have a yellow outline around them. My other two even have some purpleish tint to the leaves. One of them is thriving, with new roots and even a spike about to bloom.

The other three however, although the leaves look really healthy, they don't seem to be progressing. There is no sign of new roots. So today I decided to unpot one of them to take a peek at the roots. Here are pictures after I trimmed the bad roots.
.Mac Web Gallery

Some were dried up at the ends and most of them are yellow/brown.

I plan to repot it tomorrow morning.

Here is where I need your help.... I was thinking about spraying the roots with listerine and using a root hormone, but do you have any suggestions on what I should do? Do you know of any good rooting hormones out there?
I think the other two are the same way.... I'll look at their roots tomorrow as well.

Thanks for all your help.

Hi Singingirl, The plant looks good. You did a nice job trimming it. What I see looks nice and healthy. I think the listerine would be a good precaution. Were the roots really bad before you trimmed it? Did it have alot of black mushy roots?
Sometimes it does take a while for an orchid to bounce back from near death; 6 months is not unusual. They look good now, so you are doing something right. :)
K-L-N is a root hormone but that is all I know. I have never used it yet. Perhaps someone else can advise you better than I.

Those roots look OK to me because some of my phals have the exact same roots! :biggrin: All I get out of my babies is new leaves. I'm growing my very first spike, which is fascinating. I heard that phals didn't need as much light, so for a long time, they didn't get very much direct light. I moved them to a new location in a Southern facing window that gets direct light for about 4 hours a day--now they are much happier. I think you're going to be OK. I shouldn't talk because I obsess about the smallest little things with my orchids, but I just wanted to let you know that I think they will thrive soon.

I don't think your plan is dying :D I brought a phal back from the dead using K-L-N I bought from Ray, it wiorked wonders! :D

Maybe you should give it a try. just my 2 cents