Which medium for dehydrated Dend? Help!

[elaines]

Hi! I'm a bad orchid mommy.

I totally let my orchids dry out - more than ever before. I decided this morning to soak them in distilled water for an hour each to rehydrate the mix & roots. Oops. Forgot I'm not coordinated & my Dendrobium Banura Jade fell over onto the floor. All the mix fell out and the keiki (formed due to another incidence of not watering) on the tallest stalk broke off. I immediately placed Dend, its keiki, and BLC in distilled water to soften roots and rehydrate for emergency care.

The keiki has 4-5 small (1" or less) roots. I got orchid moss at Lowe's (some sort of sphagnum by Better-Gro) which is soaking now. I'll plant the keiki in that - as well as a barely-alive w/ 1 speck of healthy root BLC) and hope the 2 survive. I've read instructions on how to pot in sphagnum (soak moss, wring out, pot firmly but gently w/moss still spongy not tight) but will take any suggestions.

My biggest dilemma now is which mix to use for repotting Dend. Please help! I've got on hand:
-Better-Gro Premium Orchid Mix from Lowe's (fir looks somewhat in decay already but not toxically so)
-Repotme.com's Cattleya Classic mix (dried out and well-preserved for repotting the BLC when healthy and my phals)
-Repotme.com's Onicidium/Seedling Classic Mix (also dried out and well-preserved for a Wilsonara that I tried to save too late).

I've attached a picture of the plants' roots. The BLC leaves look awful - starting to yellow and puckered. The Dend is VERY dehydrated but has good roots (granted w/plenty of bad) but is a very resilient plant. Would have bloomed if I had watered it when the spike started forming.

Any help will be much appreciated!!! The plants have been soaking for about 4.5 hours now (2:45 pm Central USA) so I know I need to help them quickly. The moss should be about ready to use (soaked ~1.5 hrs now). I have no idea how long the Better-Gro Orchid Mix from Lowe's should soak. It's been soaking ~1.5 hrs now, too. The repotme.com mixes will need to soak if I use them. Since they're orchid husk chip mixes, I think they only need an hour to soak? Anyone know?

This disaster is my turning point. I love my plants and have been so neglectful of them. Even my plumerias are horribly in need of TLC.

Thanks for your help! I appreciate any advice!!!

-Elaine

[NewBloom]

RepotMe's Oncidium mix might be too light to balance out the weight of your den. Their catt mix would be a better choice, I think.

Soaking the dried out mixes for about an hour seems like a good idea. But also inspect the media throughout that time too check if its not too soggy or still dry.

[elaines]

Thanks for the reply, NewBloom!

Finally went with the Catt mix a couple of hours ago. Took a while to do the whole repotting thing - and cleaning the long humidity tray.

While cutting out the dead roots on the Dend (and there were quite a few but also a lot of healthy roots, I think), the rhizome split. It looks like there was growth (or attempted) at two places on the rhizome and each wound up on a separate half. Now, each half has about 4 canes. One looks more promising for growth than the other but the one that doesn't look most promising for new growth has the healthiest cane by far. After soaking that many hours (like 9 - I'm guessing way too many?), the biggest and healthiest cane (which had the keiki on it's tip) had plumped back up. Anyway, both halves are now planted in the Catt mix and the keiki & BLC are ensconced in moss.

I have no idea what will be the final outcome of the BLC but the keiki looks promising. I'll watch for growth, etc. Any idea on when to transfer from moss to mix?

Thanks for the advice. Nice to have someone agree with the direction I took! Who knows, this Dend has looked a whole lot worse in the past. Maybe it has another life left in it! Worth a chance. It has the most beautiful blossoms - can't wait to see them again someday.