Growing Orchids
Unlike orchids: they are breathtakingly beautiful, delicate, long-flowering, long-lived, attractive in scent and shape and very diverse. Some pleasures in the garden that surpass the thrill of watching orchids thrive. Here's everything you need to know about growing orchids - and we'll list the most common orchid varieties.
Once rare and expensive, orchids are now sold more than any other houseplant, surpassing African violets, chrysanthemums and poinsettias. This is because modern cloning techniques allow plants to produce massively, and cultivation that took seven years from seed to flowering now takes only two.
About Orchids
The orchid family is the largest in area of flowering plants: more than 25,000 species grow naturally on every continent except Antarctica. The largest concentrations of orchid species are found in the tropics of the world, namely Asia and Central and South America. In most parts of North America, orchids should be grown indoors (exceptions include native species such as female slipper).
Each orchid has a characteristic, highly developed lip, a petal with three petals and three tips blooming, some joined together.
Each orchid evolved to attract a specific pollinator, which led to the largest appearance of orchids.
Orchids epiphytic (wind growing) or terrestrial (earth growing); Most tropical orchids are epiphytic. In forests, epiphytes cling to trees and stumps, attracting moisture from fog and rain and decomposing leaves.
Planning
We’ve all seen orchids in supermarkets and home stores and wondered if they were a brilliant buy. “Absolutely,” says Mark Hustadorian, supervisor of the glass house collector at the New York Botanical Gardens. "Cheap orchids are less likely to thrive. Choose a strong, healthy-looking plant.
Most store-bought orchids have spaghetti moss soaked in roots packed in cheap plastic pots. This is a problem because they need air flow to avoid root rot. Once you bring yours home, you will need to re-register it.
Reviewing Orchids
General pot tips
Do not put it back on when a plant is flowering, as the flowers may be affected. Enjoy the flowers, then cut out the spent flower spike with sterile cuttings and replant the orchid.
When an orchid leaves its pot, the roots go down to the sides of the pot, or the growing medium is reduced to crushed food, which is the time for replanting. Repeat at the beginning of the next growth cycle (usually in the spring).
Orchids need to be very soft in their pots so you can pick the plant with its leaves and not shake the roots.
How to retrieve an orchid
Carefully remove the orchid from its existing pot. Fresh orchids are usually sold in thin plastic containers that can be cut.
Dispose of old pot media, especially if it looks like it is broken or rotting.
Examine the roots of the orchid and cut out the blackened, hollow, fluffy or damaged ones. Healthy roots are white or green.
Hold the plant vertically in the new pot, fill it with fresh pot media around it, and gently tap about an inch from the top of the pot.
Pour water into the orchid well and let the media settle around its roots. Add more media if needed.
If the plant is not in that position, stack it until its roots catch new media. Green bamboo and curly willow make attractive stocks.
Orchid growing medium
Do not plant an orchid in quality pot soil. All orchids - especially epiphytic species - need a lot of air around their roots. Excellent media is one of the lightest, finest and fastest filters.
Larger plants with older roots do better in rough growing media.
Most garden stores sell specialty orchid pot mixes:
Orchid pot mixes are made of fine, medium or coarse fir bark pieces that are usually combined with perlite, charcoal or sphagnum moss and horticultural charcoal. (You can mix the strips of four to six parts yourself for each of the other parts.)
Orchid pots
Orchids usually grow in terra cotta pots
Are allowed because they allow for extra ventilation. There are even special orchid pots with wide drainage slits around the sides of the pot. These “bifoles” allow air movement and make it easy to check the health of the roots.
Select a large pot to allow it to grow at least an inch around the roots.
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