Need some advice, Orchids are dying!

[Possum-Pie]

I bought my first Phalaenopsis 5 years ago from a box store. Left it in the original pot, watered about 1/week, and it did wonderfully. A friend gave me 3 more that he didn't want, and they all did wonderfully. I bought 2 more so had 6. A year ago, for Christmas, I got larger ceramic pots from people as gifts. I bought Miracle Grow Orchid media and begun transplanting. I read that some media carried disease/insect eggs, so I microwaved the media to kill any pathogens. After cooling down, I transplanted them all. None did well after that. They slowly lost leaves, and began long slow deaths. 14 months later and I now have only 2 left out of 6. What went wrong? I go to Longwood Gardens frequently, and took an online orchid course by them that suggested that orchids like small pots. Could the pot size have killed them? Perhaps it was the new media...It is medium chunk bark and I put a bit of sphagnum moss. Watering habits didn't change, I began using orchid fertilizer this summer thinking maybe that was the problem, but it didn't help. Symptoms include leaves getting floppy, yellowing, dropping off, crown turning dark, roots shriveling, blackening, then ultimately death. Any suggestions?

[WaterWitchin]

Sounds like they're getting way too wet and lack of air to roots.

Is it the kind of Miracle Grow for Orchids mix that looks like potting soil mixed with some bark? Not trying to be offensive... I've never seen any Miracle Grow for Orchids mix that I would use on any orchid.

And if it's a large ceramic pot, with media that's too dense, it means the media takes even longer to dry out. When you can post pics, that would help.

[CourtneyT]

I bought Miracle Grow Orchid Mix before and found out that the media was molded even in the bag! It killed two of my phals. So I stopped buying that brand! The mix I buy now is the one in the picture. You can compare the quality. To save your orchids, you will have to get them out of the pot and check the roots.

[JScott]

Another possible explanation could have to do with what they were potted in before versus what you repotted them into. Were they growing in sphagnum moss when you got them, or was the original growing medium otherwise drastically different from the Miracle Gro orchid mix?

I have tried the Miracle Gro orchid mix (the one with the medium bark and charcoal, and maybe some other stuff; I don't remember) and I found that the fir bark used in the mix is of exceptionally low quality. It doesn't absorb much water, so it dries out remarkable quickly. After placing your plants in that mix, it is likely that you should have increased your watering frequency, especially if they were growing in a moisture-retentive medium like sphagnum moss before. It takes plants a while to adjust to a new medium, and if you don't adjust your watering practices to match the new medium, the results can be poor. What happened to your plants could possibly have been the result of chronic, long term under-watering.

Some pictures would be helpful tho.

[Paphluvr]

Totally agree with the above comments and might add that I've bought Miracle-Gro Horticultural Charcoal that had pieces in it that I could have used in my charcoal grill (although I did have a previous bag with appropriately sized pieces).

[greenpassion]

Hi. Welcome to the O. B. I will not use miracle grow mix as I found it's just like regular potting mix, and as has been mentioned, this will kill your roots. I suggest getting a large chunk bark mix, and potting them in clear plastic pots to enable you to see whether the roots are needing water. When they are silvery white, they can be watered. When they're green, they don't need it. I transition my phals ( that were previously in moss ) slowly to bark by putting them in a moss/bark mix. Then on the next repot, I go to straight bark. Posting pics would be very helpful!

[Possum-Pie]

Thank you all for the quick responses! I let it dry out between waterings, but it may have not been dry enough. I've attached pictures of the media and the fertilizer. The Miracle Grow media is course but it DOES have fine particles that may be keeping it too wet. What about the pot size?

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[greenpassion]

So it looks like the last photographs is the Miracle Grow mix? At least that's what it looked like when I had bought it. The first two photos look pretty good. Is that the Miracle-Gro?

[Possum-Pie]

Originally Posted by greenpassion

So it looks like the last photographs is the Miracle Grow mix? At least that's what it looked like when I had bought it. The first two photos look pretty good. Is that the Miracle-Gro?

Yes. There is some fineness to it, but it seems to a newbie like me that it isn't more absorbent than sphagnum moss.



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[Mountaineer370]

Originally Posted by Possum-Pie

What about the pot size?

You said in your first post that you got "larger ceramic pots." I may have missed it, but did you tell us how large these pots are? Are all of them orchid pots that have the many holes on the sides? And even knowing the size of the pots may not help us if we don't know the size of the orchids in them. So, again, pictures would be helpful.

In the pics you posted of the Miracle Grow mix, the first one, where it's in a pot, the actual bark chunks look like an appropriate size, but that's just one issue to consider. The quality of the bark is important. There appears to be a fair amount of sticks or debris mixed in that probably decompose pretty quickly, which is not a good thing. And in the last picture where it's in your hand, it does look like it has a lot of fine particles in it, almost soil-like. Compare yours to the pictures posted by CourtneyT. Hers is a good-quality mix, IMO.