Sans spam, "Al" spaketh thusly:

My goal is to expand my experience with stem propagation of Phals by
actually excising the node and attempting to multiply the meristematic
tissue in a liquid media but I probably won't stop there. I was thinking
of a roller drum because it looks neat. :-) A shaker table is probably
more within my budget.

Probably. The do-it-yourself ones aren't too expensive.

I have a book called Micropropagation of Orchids by Arditti and Ernst
published in 1993.

A very valuable tome; I think they sell for $250-300 right now, if
you can find one. Arditti is currently working on a follow-up. However,
the 1993 text is ancient history, and there are other problems with it as
well.

It outlines research on propagation techniques for many orchids by genera
and provides a kind of history of propagation for most but I have been
told several times that it is dated and newer info is available to
augment what was compiled in this book. I don't have this newer info
at my fingertips or really know where to get it. :-(

The briefest of "Agricola" searches turned up the following
references that may be of value- provided, of course, you can get them.

AU: Park,-S.Y.; Murthy,-H.N.; Paek,-K.Y.
TI: Protocorm-like body induction and subsequent plant regeneration from
root tip cultures of Doritaenopsis.
SO: Plant-sci. Oxford, UK : Elsevier Science Ltd. June 2003. v. 164 (6) p.
919-923.

AU: Chen,-Y.C.; Chang,-C.; Chang,-W.C.
TI: A reliable protocol for plant regeneration from callus culture of
Phalaenopsis.
SO: In-vitro-cell-dev-biol,-Plant. Largo, MD : Society for In Vitro
Biology. Sept/Oct 2000. v. 36 (5) p. 420-423.

AU: Park,-S.Y.; Murthy,-H.N.; Paek,-K.Y.
TI: Rapid propagation of Phalaenopsis from floral stalk-derived leaves.
SO: In-vitro-cell-dev-biol,-Plant. Largo, MD : Society for In Vitro
Biology. Mar/Apr 2002. v. 38 (2) p. 168-172.

AU: Tokuhara,-K.; Mii,-M.
TI: Induction of embryogenic callus and cell suspension culture from shoot
tips excised from flower stalk buds of Phalaenopsis (Orchidaceae).
SO: In-vitro-cell-dev-biol,-Plant. Largo, MD : Society for In Vitro
Biology. July/Aug 2001. v. 37 (4) p. 457-461.

AU: Young,-P.S.; Murthy,-H.N.; Yoeup,-P.K.
TI: Mass multiplication of protocorm-like bodies using bioreactor system
and subsequent plant regeneration in Phalaenopsis.
SO: Plant-cell,-tissue-organ-cult. Dordrecht, The Netherlands : Kluwer
Academic Publishers. 2000. v. 63 (1) p. 67-72.

AU: Ishii,-Y.; Takamura,-T.; Goi,-M.; Tanaka,-M.
TI: Callus induction and somatic embryogenesis of Phalaenopsis.
SO: Plant-cell-rep. Berlin, W. Ger. : Springer International. Apr 1998. v.
17 (6/7) p. 446-450.

AU: Duan,-J.X.; Chen,-H.; Yazawa,-S.
TI: In vitro propagation of Phalaenopsis via culture of cytokinin-induced
nodes.
SO: J-plant-growth-reg. New York : Springer-Verlag New York, c1982-.
Summer 1996. v. 15 (3) p. 133-137.

Any decent library (by "decent" I mean "slightly larger than the
Library of Congress") should carry some of these journals.

A few caveats should be disclosed.

1) Many of these papers are written by people that have absolutely
no clue what they're doing. One of the seminal papers on protocorm
multiplication of paphiopedilums spells the clonal names of one of the
parents two different ways, and neither of them is apparently correct. For
a paper published by Kluwer (who presumably reads the stuff they print
before they do so), it's inexcusable. Things get worse from there, as
cursory review of the literature shows that the researchers often use
formulae so crude or antiquated that they may as well have been banging
rocks together trying to get results. Anyone regularly performing orchid
work would certainly have used media that were better suited to the work
at hand.

2) Researchers don't always tip their hand. Rule 2a is that nobody
who actually *does* the work would publish how they do it, including
commercial propagators who have no interest in publishing. Spending
hundreds or thousands of hours to develop the next quantum leap in
technology is going to publish it for all to see. Even if they did,
publication can take a year or more, by which time their work should have
been leapfrogged- unless, of course, it was just someone doing a quickie
master's or doctoral thesis that managed to get their work published. In
this case, the work is probably abandoned with great relief. Rule 2b is
that the people who publish it usually haven't done the work, so they
rely on the technicians who do the work. So, before it gets sent to the
publisher, the research is ALREADY second-hand!

3) There is no rule 3.

4) It's ALWAYS cheaper to outsource the work to someone else. Of
course, cheaper doesn't equal better; nobody takes better care of your
plants than you do.

Anyway- have fun. If there are any references you absolutely,
positively can't get, drop me a line and I'll see what I can do.

Do not reply to the e-mail address in the header. It's a spam
trap, sent straight to the FTC. Have a day.

Cheers,

-AJHicks
Chandler, AZ