bury old oncidium bulb?

[lobotomizedgoat]

I'm currently repotting a no ID oncidium (might be Ons. Midnight Miracles) for the first time and I've hit a possible snag. There's a tiny old green pseudobulb pretty much centered under the mass of the plant. The base of the new growth is the bottom left lobe visible in the photos so angling it out of the medium won't work.

It had another older bulb in front of it which I was aware of as it barely poked out of the medium. That one I removed as it had started to rot, but this one appears ok. I'm not sure I even could cleanly remove this one without collateral damage, even if I wanted to.

My best guess is to pot it up with the plant slightly high and try to put slightly less medium around the old bulb. Not sure if that will work, given where it is, but it's probably what I'll try if no one happens to be on watching this right now!

*Other info: It's going into a terracotta pot with side vents and will be in a mixture of medium-small bark and pumice. Growing indoors 65-78° F with ~50-75% RH.

[Ray]

That is a very old growth that was buried during an earlier repotting.

You could just leave it there and ignore it,or remove it without harm to the plant.

[Fairorchids]

Some plants tend to climb (new growths come out higher than the previous growth).

It is important to plant the front of the plant at the correct depth, so future growth will do well. If that results in some older PBs being partially or fully buried towards the rear, so be it.

Also, the intergeneric Oncidiums will do well with plants consisting of only 2-3 PBs (as long as they have decent roots). If you have 5-6 or more PBs, you can readily divide; the back bulb piece is likely to produce a new growth.

[lobotomizedgoat]

As it turned out, the old bulb, which seemed quite firmly attached from the side, slid right out the bottom when I gave a little tug at a dead root that happened to be attached to it. I'd just given the plant a little bath so may be that removed something that was helping to anchor it.

Still, good to have the advice for next time. Thanks!