"Nick wrote in message after
David writes:
|
| we bought an orchid at Homebase last year, and it flowered for ages.
|
| When it eventually stopped flowering we put it to one side, assuming it
had
| to die back over the winter to be revived next spring.
|
| Come spring, I start looking for instructions on how to encourage it to
| flower.
|
| http://www.easyorchids.co.uk/phalaenopsis/index.html
|
| Hopefully I may be just in time to save the poor little bugger, but it
looks
| touch and go.
|
| I had no idea you kept on feeding and watering them over winter and
that
| they should always be green.
|
| I guess they just look like daffs. etc - although the lack of a bulb
should
| be a dead giveaway.

Good luck. They don't need watering very often, and I don't bother
to feed mine at all in the winter (as it isn't growing). But we
don't keep our house hot by modern standards.


Related to this, I left a Cymbidium we don't much like outside and
there was a mild frost (-3 to -4 Celcius). The fading flower spike
collapsed overnight, but the plant is fine. I suspect that a lot
of the claims of needing coddling are nonsense, though I can't say
WHICH are.


Phalaenopsis are tropical orchids and like most tropical rainforest orchids
need a bit of warmth and water all year round, in old language they are Hot
House orchids. Give it plenty of indirect light, plenty of misting (and if
so don't water much)in the mornings, don't let it get waterlogged or let
water sit in the crown, and be lucky.

Cymbidium, well they do need cool, even cold nights to initiate flower
spikes, usually not having these is the reason they don't flower, but it's
not advisable to allow them to get frosted. That said I too once left one of
mine out all winter by mistake and it survives still although it was knocked
back badly. Tougher than we are led to believe. Mine spend all summer/autumn
in the garden anyway.
--
Regards
Bob

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