Fertilizer Baskets
 

At the last Hilo Orchid Show I bought a Vanda hybrid from Carmela Orchids to mount on a tree in our yard.
As I was mounting it, I saw a small black plastic thing stuck into the moss in the plant's larger basket.
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p...psfd9b739b.jpg

After searching around a bit *I found some black ones on Amazon, ... ~$60 for 150 or so of them.
Being a cheapskate, I thought that was too expensive for what was being offered.
So, I went to eBay I found them, $22/100 prepaid shipping.
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps14a3351c.jpg

I liked the combination of colors much better.
Although, I was not sent any red or blue ones.
The only problem was they were being shipped from Thailand.
I was very leery of having to import something.
But, for $22, I was going to risk it.

I am a staunch Amazon fan and use them all the time.
Ordering through Amazon usually takes from 1 to 2 week or longer before delivery in Alaska and here in Hawai'i.
These came from Thailand by airmail, were inspected by customs and passed without any problem.
They were then delivered on the 6th day after placing the order.
I was amazed at how easy and quick it was, and will give consideration to more import orders in the future when it seems to be the best way to do it.
I have begun to use them on my raft/moss mounted species Dendribiums.
We'll see how they work.

Looks like a cool idea! I might have to buy a few as I like to use a slow release fertilizer.

Cool!

I've bought stuff from China/Hong Kong and Taiwan on ebay (usually small electronics accessories) - I usually get them in just about a week (I'm in California, could take longer if you live farther east)

I dont know what a fertilizer BASKET would be good for. Im totally lost on this one

Even if these 'fertilizer baskets' are NOT used to put fertilizer in, they would make an excellent hollow core for your larger plants that need to be dry evenly throughout the root ball.

I have been using small 2" net pots to do that. But this product provides an alternative. Thanks for posting this idea. Two inch net pots are about 23 cents a piece. I like the different colors.

I looked on eBay and found many listings. From what I saw, these baskets are used to put osmocote pellet fertilizer in the basket and then installed in a pot so that when you water the plant, some of the moisture will reach the basket and fertilize the plant.

The first photo shows the original basket as I found it filled with osmocote type fertilizer pellets.
After the ordered baskets arrived I picked up a 2-1/2# bag of 14-14-14 pellets to fill them with.
The effective life of the pellets is stated as being 4 months.
If they work as expected, it'll help my goal of:
"more orchids, less work".

Here are photos of the three Den.'s I've places the baskets on:
Den. anosmum - Our Yard - A Tour

Den. primulinum - Our Yard - A Tour

Den. crystalinum - Our Yard - A Tour

All I do is water them as needed with a garden hose.
I placed the baskets when the moss was dry.
I'll push them deeper in soon when the moss is wet.
They might be a bit more effective then.