Double repotting - will my dendrobium survive?
 

I bought my first orchid last Saturday, a Dendrobium Kngianum in full, fragrant bloom. However, I did not like the brown plastic pot it came in and repotted it as soon as I got home.
I forgot, though, to read up about repotting first and decided on a nice showy glass jar (without drainage holes) for my pretty new lady. Only to read on this forum the next day that Dendrobiums need to more airflow to their roots, and I noticed that despite tipping the jar on its side, there was still water in it. In fear of the dreaded root-rot I decided to use a shallow clear plastic bowl (this time with drainage holes) and LECA instead of the bark it had grown in and that I had used to repot it with.
However, as I repotted it several roots stuck to the bark and got damaged so I had to cut them off. It is now situated in a well- lighted spot next to the open front door with a steady breeze for ventilation. All this happened in four days! Does it have any hope of surviving? Or have I doomed my first orchid before I have had a chance to properly enjoy it?
Any help or advice would be most appreciated!

Couple of things:
1. Plants in bloom are usually not repotted; it's very stressful to a plant already expending energy to bloom--you've now damaged the root system, further stressing the plant. In the future, please wait until blooming is finished before repotting. An exception to this rule is phals, provided you are very careful with the roots.
2. On the up side, kingianum is tough as nails, you can grow them in pretty much anything, though it needs to be free draining and capable of holding humidity at the root zone. Hopefully one of the others that grow them semihydo will chime in. Personally, I use a 1:1:1 mix of coarse pumice:fine bark:medium bark or I grow them mounted.
3. For your recently repotted plant specifically, I'd not water it for 7-10 days; go ahead and mist the foliage/flowers early in the day, but do not pour water through the media in the pot--you want the cut root ends to callus and throw side shoots. Also, move it out of direct sun, 2' away from a south window is good. If flowers suddenly start to fall, cut the entire spike off with sterilized shears.
Kingianum is a great plant to start out with, I'm sure it'll make it--we all start somewhere (and kill a few along the way...)
Please let us know if you have questions and how things go,
Adam


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Thanks for the advice Adam! And the glimmer of hope. I will withhold watering then for about a week and see how it does. So far the flowers are still staying on the stalks, and some buds are starting to open. So I'll cross my thumbs and hope I won't loose any spikes.

First, Welcome here! There are a number of other Orchid Board members from RSA who may chime in with better advice than we northern hemispherians can contribute.

Your weather is pretty warm now
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=weather+in...era&ia=weather

People do things differently. I personally don't worry about root fungus after repotting when temperatures are warm and the humidity is not extremely high. If you don't water your plant in flower it will likely drop its flowers quickly. I suspect you're growing it outdoors and it has plenty of fresh air circulation. I would water now. If you're growing it in a very humid greenhouse, I would wait a few days before watering.

Quick update on my dendrobium:

So far two of its three flower spikes have wilted. I have cut them off. The third one, which had been the one with the most flowers, is still going strong. One flower seems to be going down, but the rest are still strong and fragrant. Leaves are a strong pale green, and shows no sign of wilt. The roots are all still firm to the touch. However, a few are developing black tips. Is this normal? Or is it a sign of dying/damaged roots?

Here are some pictures of my little kingianum:

http://www.orchidboard.com/community...cture12143.jpg

And the first (aborted) attempt at repotting:

http://www.orchidboard.com/community...cture12145.jpg

And how it looks now:

http://www.orchidboard.com/community...cture12144.jpg

That's a really pretty pale pink one.

An update for all those wonderful people who gave me such good advice: after finding the LECA far too unstable (my Den almost fell over twice!) I mounted it on a rock with a tiny amount of sphagnum moss. It has been resting on its new rock for a month now, and last week I noticed several new growing root tips!! I unfortunately lost all the flower stalks but so far none of the canes or leaves has shown signs of dying. :) It gets lots of bright light and I water it whenever the rock and miss is dry to the touch - every other day or so. So glad it is finally showing some signs of life! (I will post some pictures once I have access to my laptop).

Next time you do not like the pot a plant comes in, use what is called a cachepot, a larger pot into which you simply set the plant, old pot and all. Take it out of the fancy cachepot to water and thoroughly drain before putting it back in. Most cachepots do not have holes and are decorative only, so be sure the plant does not sit in water. You can also elevate the plant with rocks or empty pots in the bottom of the larger cachepot.

You have gone from one extreme to another! Too wet to too dry.

Depending on where you live and where you have your plant, I would not generally recommend mounting a kingianum unless you are in a wet, humid climate or a controlled greenhouse. They thrive in a bark or coco husk with 20% perlite added mix and prefer to be outdoors when not in bloom. House conditions will not give them enough light.

Just my opinion after growing specimen sized Den kingianum in Nor California for 30 years.