Phal Producing Continuous Kieki's?
 

Hi All,

This is my first post here, so will do my best to get all the info correct.

First off, I'm a newbie to orchids. Have loved them for years and have had them for years but only been able to get them to re-bloom a second time on tme same spike.

Two years ago I purchased Dtps Happy Cat "Hello Kitty" Phal from Van Dusen Gardens annual plant sale. I didn't write the dates down when it finished flowering but I purchased in April and it flowered for months with a second flowering on the same spike. I left the spike after that to see what it would do and it ended up producing a kieki. I left the keiki on the sike until it had 3 roots which were 4" long, and two nice 5" long leaves.

I have since repotted the mother phal into a new pot along with new potting meduim from repotme.com (moss, bark, cork, plus more all in the mix) and also cut the kieki off the spike and repotted it in the same pot at the mother phal to give it support. I did this Jan 15th so just over 1 month ago.

I have been watering just as the medium has almost dried out, and fertilize with each watering (ends up being about once per week).

The mother plant seems happy, it is putting out a new leaf which is 2 1/2" long and also a new root with is almost 2" long. The baby plant also seems happy, nice strong leaves, I haven't noticed any roots but I am assuming it is just getting settled.

Now... I noticed two days ago that the mother plant is yet again growing a kieki on the spike! I did'nt cut that spike all the way back when I cut off the first kieki. I thought I'd see what it did.

Is this normal for phals to keep growing kiekis? Should I just let this one stay on momma since it seems happier with a kieki on it? I would love to get it to grow a new bloom spike but it has yet to do that.

I will also mention I moved the plant to a new room with lower temps over night, it is sitting in my bathroom window which is south east, it gets sun for several hours during the day and since the window has blinds I can control the sunlight when it is too hot/strong.

Any info you can provide would be great. I want to make sure I keep this phal happy!
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Thanks!

I would leave the keiki on the mother for as long you can, unless the mother or keiki look stressed. To me, it looks awesome when you see mothers and their keikis spiking at the same time.

I think I will leave this keiki on the mother. So the mother will eventually send out a new bloom spike even though it has this spike currently?

There are some species that are "keiki generators" by nature, and others that are not.

Happy Cat is an extremely complex hybrid that does not contain a lot of the former, so if it is generating a lot of keikies, I would suspect there is something awry with the culture that is making it do so as a means of carrying on its gene pool as a defensive measure.

How much fertilizer are you applying, and what is the formula?

The picture and your description sounds like this is a pretty happy plant. As long as the mother plant & keikis are healthy and it keeps blooming, I would say your culture is fine.

The fertilizer I use is pretty basic. I am thinking it order some from repotme.com and also some Quantum Orchid to see if that will help. Meanwhile the current fertilizer is Shultz 15-5-5 I use 0.53 ml per liter per the instructions. I poor the water through the plant over the sink so it's saturated but completely drained. And am careful to keep the crown and leaves dry.

I hadn't repotted it since I got it 2 years ago. Didn't know too much about orchids and I've been doing allot of reading the last few months. So I got proper mix and repotted it as I said above. The roots didn't seem too bad, no mushy roots but it did seem like there could have been more roots.

---------- Post added at 07:09 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:05 AM ----------

Oh and it hasn't re-bloomed. But I had it in my living room until last month which is quite a bit darker and warmer. I have another phal which is in the living room now but it is in full bloom, once it's finished blooming I'll check the roots and move it. I am guilty of having bought 3 more from Walmart that I couldn't pass up. 😳

I suppose that's not so bad - 80 ppm N once a week.

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