Repotting Oncidium Sharry Baby with lots of aerial roots
 

Planning on converting the Sharry Baby I purchased into SH. Flowers have just faded and I am really not sure if she is actively growing new roots. Her pot is a bird's nest of swirling roots and algae plus a lot of aerial roots. Do I repot now? And if I do, do I keep those aerial roots out of the pot? I expect they will just die in New growing environment. I know some are alive - they green up when I spray them. I would, honesty like to get them out of the way since they take up so much room.

Thanks!

:bump:

Welcome to the Orchid Board!

I wouldn't repot now, going into winter, unless you can keep it warm, humid and well-lit with artificial lights through the winter. Even then I would think twice.

As you alluded, the best time to move to S/H is when new roots are forming, if you can keep it warm, humid and well-lit. This particular Oncidium usually begins making new roots a little after the new vegetative shoot starts developing. That is the time to move to S/H. This hybrid tends to make new shoots after every flowering, so there are many chances to repot through the year.

I agree. Old roots don't tend to transition well into SH.

Over a year back I put a new Sherry into S/H using Ray's guide, sort of. The plant was basically a mass of rotted roots with lots of actively growing aerial roots much like you describe. Currently its outgrowing the pot I put it in.
Anyway, what I did is I cut back all the brown rotted roots until I could see the white bottoms of the bulbs and planted the aerial roots into the shallow area of a temporary pot in hopes of keeping the bulbs from shriveling from a lack of moisture. I applied heat on the bottom of the container. The aerial roots lasted the plant long enough for new roots to grow. I unpotted the plant one last time to confirm this and removed a few unhappy aerial roots that didn't like the transition. This hybrid seems very forgiving so I doubt you'll mess up especially with this forum. ;)

Here's some photos of this procedure.
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Well the Sharry Baby decided to start some new growths - so into SH she went. I grow indoors and have heat mats for the new SH plants, so even with Montana winter upon us, I think she will do well. Her older bulbs are a little wrinkled, but I can see new root growth. Fingers crossed.

On another note, I have a rescue Wils. Hilda Plum Tree 'Purple Wings' that I put into SH Sept 4th - and she is growing (my first) flower spike! Yay for SH!