Wow, I know this is an old post but when you said you were a beginner I was not expecting that grow room. That is beautiful. My shady, humid spot is a bunch of shade cloth stapled to the side of a shed
I agree with the previous post, especially if you culture endangered or rare species of any genus, knowing how to research care using genus, location, climate, altitude ect. is what separates the horticulturalist from the hobbyist that likes to garden.
*How I care for Polliculosum- Mine is mounted bare on a 3x3 piece of driftwood (except for a thin sheet of plastic web that holds just a tad of moisture) . I have it in a 100 gal terrarium and it hangs below center on the opposite side of the fogger. From my research I believe that the region it comes from has a strong monsoon climate, with intense sun, and hot temperatures. Because of this I never let the temps in the terrarium drop below 70f and prefer closer to 80. I assume that this species grows at least 2-3ft off the ground, so I imitate an environment that is hot and gets heavy rain 2-3 times a day. When watering I usually pull the bottom of the still hanging mount towards me so that the plant is on a shallow slope, and then use a small watering can to pour water over the top-ish end of the mount and allow it to run down the mount. (Someone will prob feel the urge to say something here about soaking the plant this way. Well I try not to wet the leaves. But aint nobody got time to water micro orchids like that) One of the keys is using good water. I use RO, distilled is fine. I do have this weird quirk that I wont get into about using distilled for very long periods of time, but don't worry about it. I like mounting these on driftwood because it is just porous enough to hold a good soaking, but will dry out after a few hours. When this plant is leafed out it would be tough to overwater when mounted this way. I soak the mount every day in the morning, I lay it face up in a saucer, not submerging the plants....is what you should do, I soak it when I start feeling guilty and there are reruns on tv. Lastly, lighting can be a little on the tricky side. It is definitely a shade plant, but remember the sun is very intense in it's environment. I believe this one is a good candidate for a little help from an LED grow light. I just use a 12w Tao Tronic bulb on a gooseneck fixture.
Most of this info is for when it is leafed out. If the plant seems to be going/is dormant, think of this as a sliding scale and do the least when there are no leaves. I hope this helps someone, there is still not a lot of culture information on this species. But just remember to listen to advice, but most importantly listen to what the plant is telling you.
Charles
Linear Mode
