Dendrobium Unicum - No Clue, Dormancy
 

Hey everyone. I have a question about an orchid I purchased back at the beginning of April. I bought a Dendrobium Unicum from a hobbyist and I believe he knows what he's talking about as he has two huge greenhouses full of healthy and flowering plants.

The Dendrobium Unicum I bought from him was in dormancy. He basically said not to do anything to it until it started putting out leaves. The media, which I think is moss, was hard. I'd asked him about watering it. He said I could, but not to go overboard until it started growing leaves.

I've now had it for 2 months and have seen no changes. I don't water if often, and when I do I just drop it in a sink full of warm water with a couple of other plants and let it soak for a while. When I do, the roots that are exposed and much of the stalks will turn green for a while.

I have no experience with dendrobiums. This is my first. I'm a little worried about it. I've read that you can simply not water or give very little water to dendrobiums from Halloween till valentines day, but this is well past that time. I also know it went from a humid greenhouse to inside my house where humidity tends to be between 40% and 55%, according to a cheap meter I have. Temps hover around the mid to low 70's. It gets moderately bright light from a 6500k cfl and a west facing window.

Can anyone reassure me on about this plant. Should I water it more or be doing anything to stimulate it to start growing? There is a small keiki on the side. It has good roots and I'll remove it once it starts growing, but I worry about the roots not being in the media and getting that little extra bit of water. That's mostly why I soak instead of straight water.

Once it does start growing, do you water it as often as you water other orchids, or do you look for a sign, like the canes starting to shrivel. With it liking a period of dryness, I just didn't know if it liked a lot of water once it started growing. Thanks for the help.

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Not sure why but photos aren't showing up...

I've posted about this before, not about unicum but about other species... and as of yet, no one has given me direct insight, so it remains a bit of a mystery... maybe there's not a lot of den species growers here, or no one seems to have a concrete answer... so hopefully someone may chime in with something perhaps more... hopeful... haha...

Many of my den species have basically sat there without leaves some of them and did not grow for months. Actually this is known to be normal for Nobile type species, however there are many other species that pretty much do this. They lose their leaves, give them a drier winter, colder temps and viola flowers in spring summer, new growths follow...

however, doesn't always work that way...

We know that many den species can lose their leaves, but considering I've had a couple species without leaves for more than 6 months and no sign of life other than green pseudobulbs, the question I have is can this be normal and ok for certain species, and the answer is, well, yes.

I have lamyiae which is allied to unicum, and it's been leafless for 8 months+ and still no growth, and finally talking with Andy phillips about it recently he told me that they are the last to leaf out, sometimes not leafing out till july or august then losing their leaves in november... not a long growing season, if you ask me.

I have unicum now but got it a couple months ago with a spike that blasted and a new growth, thankfully. The growth is ever so slowly growing but no new roots as of yet.

So basically all that said, for this species it's a bit normal to not grow really for a while into spring. Just be patient, and I'd say keep it watered so stems don't shrivel and hopefully it should start a new growth at base, then roots, then water it very well to plump it up until it loses it's leaves and goes dormant again. I wouldn't water it too much until new roots form however.

as prologue, let me say that I grew it indoors under lights years ago and that thing never really went leafless, was not subjected to cooler winters, and still flowered well in spring for me. so it's possible that if temps don't go down, it may not lose it's leaves completely and me keep it cycled a bit faster to pick up growing faster earlier in spring. I'd still cut watering back in winter.

I grow outdoors here in LA and being colder and drier does seem to slow things down with warmer growers, but many of my dens that were dormant started new growths, so again just may take time.

Thanks for the reply. I'm down here in South Carolina. I could try growing it outside if anyone thinks that would help. The guy I got it from lives about 45min from my house, so we have the same weather. I think he said it had recently flowered and then dropped all the flowers before I bought it.

Like I said above, I'm growing it inside by a light and a window. He was growing it in a hoop house year round. I'm sure it did experience some temp fluctuations. He could have skimped on the water, but I think the humidity would have been fairly high all year round.

It just makes my skin crawl, not being able to water an orchid a lot. I'm usually having to kick myself in the butt to get up and water all of them. I know mentally that I don't need to water it too much, but it's hard to let it sit there for a week or two and not want to water the mess out of it.

I'll continue to just water it periodically until new growth comes around. If anyone else has any insights, they'd be appreciated as well. Thanks again U Bada.

---------- Post added at 04:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:35 PM ----------

I think the picture address was screwed up. I'm at work, so none of the pics will show for me. I corrected the link, I hope. They should display now.

This orchid plant has the smell of crayons when it blooms. You need not worry about it losing leaves it will grow new canes and that will produce leaves. The mature canes will produce flowers from mid winter to spring. This kind of Dendrobium grows in cool to warm temperatures and give it medium amounts of light. You may put it outdoors but not in direct sun. Keep the plant evenly moist and fertilize every other week during growth season mid spring to late autumn. During winter reduce watering until new shoots appear but it doesn't mean you let it dry out if you are watering it in the warmer months every other day= then in mid winter water it weekly until you see new growths then continue with regular regimen. You inherited this in a clay pot with a good mix so you may replant it after two years. Two weeks before frost put it indoors.

ok, see the pics... the canes look nice a plump so I think it's good to go... the water stored will help to get that new growth going.

You can look at it this way, without leaves much transpiration can happen, so that means not much water intake from roots is happening... so if you water a lot when it's in this state, it's just going to sit there in the pot and it'll lead to rot. Many dens from mid elevation forests in southeast asia, like this one, do experience a dry season and dropping it's leaves and going dormant is one way to deal with it, and we just sorta have to go with it's cycles to grow well...

Not sure how people get away with growing things in pots and moss, but looks like the media could be deteriorated by now so eventually soon you may need to repot. after you water it again and it's moist, try sticking a toothpick in there and seeing how rotten or fresh it is... if rotten of course, switch to a media your comfortable with that can allow it dry out a bit... Potted you definitely want to make sure not to overwater this kind of den.

Bud gives good culture advice especially as he grows on your side of the country. I would add, that it's not too particular on needing high humidity, I think 50 works just fine. lower it may need spraying down early mornings or early evenings on warmer drier days.

I think it'll grow when it gets warmer.

Den. unicum is endemic to Vietnam, Laos and Thailand which is a very humid equatorial area of the world. They have monsoon rains that floods the plains and a couple of dry months but then again the morning dew wets the roots of these plants so it never gets really dry not like other winter rests for other Dendrobiums where one must not water or suffer the blooms....on the last picture I noticed a small new growth so you must start watering it every other day. I also noticed that your media mix is moss....try to get a Dendrobium mix online from one of the reputable orchid mix sellers....you want the water to drain and let the media be evenly moist but not soaking wet=and moss does soak water. Notice that the longest cane you got has the tip starting to turn yellowish, it means it is dying. The roots of that specific cane must be rotting so don't let the others get the rot too and change media already and follow a watering and fertilizer regimen religiously. Just remember by mid winter stop fertilizer and do a dryer watering regimen.

Mine is mounted, and I water it practically every day, year round. I don't worry about humidity, and it can get pretty low over the winter. It usually blooms in the summer, but throws an occasional flower through late winter.

I had D. unicum briefly before snails killed every single new growth.

I would mount it now. Leave it outside, adjust to moderate light, let the dew & rain provide water until growth starts.

Okay, guys. I need to do an update on this plant. A few weeks ago, I was watering it as mentioned, by setting it in a sink of warm water with a couple of other plants and letting them soak for a while.

When I went to pick it up out of the sink, the plant fell out of the media. There were just a few black roots at the bottom.

I decided to try to leave it out of the media and water it once a week, like one poster above mentioned. It has not done well. I can't remember if it was this post/site or somewhere else, but someone noted that one of the cane tips was yellowing. Well now, that cane as well as one growing out of it are mostly yellow and I feel I should remove them. The keiki that was growing on it is still okay, I suppose, but it along with the other canes have severely shrunk.

As of yesterday, I soaked the pot with the hard media and the plant and then placed the plant back in the media. I'm hoping that it'll hold a little more moisture for the plant and maybe slightly increase the humidity.

I really don't know what to do here. I've been told a couple of conflicting things and I'm obviously not doing the correct ones. Some people say that leaflessness for months is fine, others say that it never really drops leaves for them and they water year round. Some people have said not to really water at all when in dormancy, because it causes root rot. I don't know if that was me or the previous grower, but there was rot. Others say that dormancy means watering once a week as opposed to every other day.

The man I bought it from is part of a semi-local orchid society. I'll be going to a monthly meeting this Saturday and I plan to take it and ask him about it. However, I'd love a game plan from you guys. I'll attempt to get more pictures for you to look at.

Mine is never completely leafless. Right now it only has leaves on the newest canes and is putting out buds and blooms. It normally starts putting on new growth in the fall before the last leaves have dropped.

It can take an orchid with rotten roots a long time to show the problem, but when they do, they might die rapidly. There's no telling when your plant began having problems.

This plant should be in vigorous, active, leafy growth during warm weather. It should not be dropping leaves until much later in the season. So, something has been wrong with your plant for a while.

It's highly unnatural to grow epiphytes in pots. Roots stay too wet for too long, or they're too dry and you don't see it. Many epiphytic orchids are tough, easy-to-grow plants that do just fine in pots. Others, however, are so touchy they are much easier to manage on mounts. I am finding I really struggle with Dendrobiums in pots. They are much easier on mounts for me.

I may try one on a mount at some point. If this one doesn't make it, I'll see if they guy has another one.

Why not mount that one? Give it a good soak in kelpmax and mount it with a small pad of sphagnum. What do you have to lose?

I might do that. I was considering replacing the media with LFS, but if I'm going to do that, why not mount it. I don't have anything handy to mount it to, though. I'd have to prepare something. I've never done that before, but I think I can figure it out.

You have woods........

Ha! Yeah, I do have woods and I could easily lop off a branch and use it.

However, never having done it or looked into it, I don't know the dos and don'ts. Do you use greenwood or dead wood? If you use dead wood, how would you treat for pests? Microwave it? Does the type of wood matter. Something like oak is going to have a lot of tannic acid unless you soak it for a long time with water changes. Does that make a difference?

Oak is fine, although I might not use it for rupiculpus Laelia and other lime lovers. Andy's sells a lot of theirs on cedar branches.

Don't give up hope; I have Den. lamyaiae just now throwing new growth; they've been just hanging out (literally) since mid March... I received them bare root and mounted them on tree fern; I watched the roots take over their mounts, but no new growth...once the roots reached "critical mass", new growth...


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That's funny, my dendrobium lamyaiae (related to unicum) is also just now starting new growth... but it had been leafless for probably 9 months lol close to a year maybe...

I've cursed about den species (specifically those that can go leafless or semi-leafless), they literally have their own time clock depending on their particular genetics or apparently who they're with or where they're going...

Unicum is a good example. For some they bloom almost immediately in early spring right out of dormancy, for others it never goes dormant and flowers in summer, yet other's it's blooming now...??? I've seen them with leaves, with no leaves... I've even grown one before years ago that never lost leaves and would flower in early summer and grew roots and stems all year...

My current one, an obvious 2 stem/pbs division with a new growth and not great roots, planted in sphag mind you, received in spring at some point with buds that blasted... I had to depot (just a few ok roots)and tied to a branch when new growth got to about an inch... new roots formed and I watered and watered and it was doing well, then snails ate all the new roots. that new growth has stayed looking about the same for about 2 month, not changing whatsoever, and no new roots to replace the eaten roots. I just spray it down every once in a while... since it doesn't have roots it's really just to attempt to keep it hydrated really... it's in a big glass bowl outside in my balcony (in shade), hanging off side so at least the humidity can be kept somewhat stable...

so anyway that's my thoughts- it's set back for sure but can take time to recover but can actually stay alive without leaves or roots for quite a while and may regrow at some point...

If you mount, wouldn't mess with finding a branch. (friend and I were just talking about molds and other fungus growing like nuts on different wood mounts) If there's somewhere to get a piece of cork, I'd just get something already prepped and ready for domestic use. If you're not sure where to get a piece, try online or try local pet stores that sell reptiles. They tend to have pieces lying around for herp environments.

If you don't mount, maybe cut all bad growth off, powder cinnamon or whatever you do to disinfect and bag with reasonably damp sphag until new growth starts. When roots start, pot in very open miss and don't water frequently whatsoever...

I was watching a youtube video on slingshot making and they said one way to speed the process up was to stick the wood in the microwave on high for 60 seconds and then on 30 second intervals as long as you see steam coming out. It was their way of "aging" small pieces of wood. I wonder if that would prevent the mold issues you were talking about.

I went to my orchid club meeting last Saturday and took it with me to ask for advice. I mostly got ribbed about killing it, but I got a few pieces of helpful advice. It was all completely contradictory, though, so yeah.

Anyway, I'll probably use some combination of it. The guy I'd gotten it from pushed the LFS it was in tighter around it and said don't mess with it. Another person said to water it once every 2-3 weeks. Another person, who made more sense to me objectively said that with no leaves the plant doesn't have anything to do with the water I give it and it will just rot the roots.

That made the most sense to me, with the caveat that I don't know what I'm doing. It just seemed to make logical sense. However, it also makes sense to me not to leave it in a low humidity room and do zilch with it. In the wild it'd would get mist or at least moisture from the higher humidity. Also, there should be a small amount of photosynthesis going on with the canes.

It had actually completely fallen out of the media when people were checking it out. The person who helped me the most said that they'd probably just leave it sitting on top of the moss in the small clay pot its in. Possibly even leave that tray sitting in water. That would increase the humidity for the plant without having it sitting in water. I think it's similar to you bag with sphagnum moss. The only difference is the air flow.

I'm actually inclined to try you idea more as it would ramp up the humidity the most. I only worry about rot with the stagnant air.

Like you, the person helping me said that when it did start showing growth, they'd pot it in something like orchiata. A small sized free draining mix.

That is reinforced by what I saw on Orchid Girl's youtube.com channel about watering Dendrobium nobile. She said that while they like very frequent watering while in growth, they don't like to have the media soaking.

I have one that is mounted. I wet the roots daily. It lost it's leaves then grew new ones. It bloomed and now it's starting to loose leaves again. Here is mine in bloom.

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beautiful wintergirl!

The thing is some woods rot less or more than others over time. Once wood rots enough mold/fungus start developing (natural process, i.e. like on forest floor). So even if you're able to disinfect it, eventually it can rot. might be a while, but depends not he wood. Cork seems to last really long. Many oaks (cork for instance is a type of oak). Cedar.

So re your society's talk, yes it's all very confusing isn't it? LOL (but good insight from them to be sure) I've griped about species dendrobium on here before... and well, it's just something to accept. I have a lot of species, and actually it's a pretty diverse group, but seems like if you do something wrong they just take a while to bounce back and usually it requires little watering and lots of patience. Sometimes they just die... oy.

The bag method... I've tried the bag method and the keeping it on sphag with numerous leafless stems/ pseudobulbs with numerous species... sometimes they take sometimes they don't. I've had best success with bag method. The issue with air flow is that it increases respiration so water leaves the plant to some degree (without leaves it's not a lot of respiration but still some) but with no roots there's nothing to take up water. It can only do that through osmosis... that's why I think bag method works best... but it's not full proof for sure. It's a good idea to keep the bag slightly open so it's not completely stagnant... If there's an infection, it can certainly make matters worst, so either bag or not make sure to disinfect the plant with physan, or hydrogen peroxide (diluted), and/or just let dry completely for a day or so before you put on sphag pot or in a bag. if the pseudobulbs are plump enough it has water to keep it green and alive for a shocking long amount of time.

That said, I'm not sure what the yellowing of of the pbs, mean, maybe snap a pic.

I just started using orchiata this year, heard and read great things about it. I think it would be a great media for many dendrobium species as it is said to dry fast and doesn't break down for a long time anyway. They don't like to be disturbed root wise from my experience, whatsoever...

Sweet orchid, wintergirl.

U bada, I'll definitely snap some picks as it is now, to compare with the pics in my original post. It's definitely shriveling.

I had a carnivorous plant that wasn't doing good over the winter. I ended up taking a small clear trash bag and clipped it up to a clothes hanger I had hung on the lamp. The only issue I think it might have had was that the plastic, even being clear was probably blocking some of the light waves. It did get the humidity up to 70%+ even with the bag mostly open at the top. I had a humidity reader, but it recently quite working on me. I have to try to get it replaced. You can only read half the numbers now.

Some carnivorous plants go dormant in the winter. Mine never go completely dormant but they are inside and it does get cooler in the room in winter but not cold. Some people put their carnivorous plants in a garage or basement in winter.

You're right. I'm here in SC and I leave my Venus Flytraps and Sarracenias out all winter. The sarrs die back and I just cut all the tubes off in the spring before it starts blooming again. The VFT's just grow smaller traps closer to the ground.

They were out in weather that got down to 10deg last winter and they were find. I was told once in a bonsai class that it's actually better to water bonsai when it's going to freeze. They said the water freezes the whole pot solid and the roots are kept stable. They said that if the pot is dry, then the roots will freeze, expand, and burst. I guess it's similar for the CP's. I've had the pots freeze solid and they're just find. They sit on the front steps all year in saucers of water. I just top the water off when I water the dog. My biggest issue with them so far is the dog and cat will bypass their own water dishes and drink out of my CP trays.

They're natural to my state though, so I don't have to do anything special. I have heard of people putting them in basements and even in refrigerators. Either way, they have to have a dormancy or they die on you.

The plant I was referring to above, though was a Nepenthes 'Lady Luck'. It's a tropical CP and it doesn't have a winter dormancy.

We had a cp grower speak at our orchid meeting and was surprised that my plants did not go dormant or die. IDK, they stay in live moss setting in a dish of rain water. Never lost any.

What types did you have and how long did they go without a dormancy?

I have more now but the ones I had over last winter were Drosera natalensis, Pinguicula primulifora, and Pinguicula moraneasis. None of those died or seemed dormant. They also all bloomed for me. Now I have some Sarracenia & B52 Venous fly traps so things may change. I am a total novice in CP so I really didn't know what I was doing. I bought the butterworts but the drosera just came from seeds that must have been in the plants I bought.

I just looked and my primulifora was blooming Jan 14th, that is when this picture was taken.

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I don't have any pings or drosera, just VFT's and Sarracenia. I read that you can actually force young Sarracenia and leave them in a warm place with lots of light for a couple of years and give them a big jump start, but they said if you don't rest them on that third year they'll start dying on you. I don't know much about the drosera or pings.

I was, and basically still am, a novice at CP's. I've just done a lot of reading and research, along with my first hand experience. I actually got my first flowers from a CP this year. It was my VFT. It put out about 7 flower spikes. They were doing great, but then all but two died. I don't think the other two got pollinated. I was going to do it manually, but I was too late.

I would recommend you check out terraforums.com as well as a book by Peter D'Amato called "The Savage Garden". That's what really helped me out. I'd found all kinds of bad advice before that on the internet and I'd killed several plants.

I'd been reading things like plant in peat moss, but just top water and leave over a saucer of water for humidity. Of course the peat dried out and turned rock hard, starving it of water. I was also doing ridiculous things like taking a week solution of miracle grow and rubbing it on the underside of the leaves. Only the undersides, though, according to the article.

Since finding "The Savage Garden" I put them in their preferred mix of sand and peat. I set them in a tray of water on the front steps, keep those trays topped off with water, and let the rain water flush them periodically. They've done amazing. I do that year round and the only other care I give them is removing dead plant material. I did have to treat one sarr for aphids, but that has been it.