First cold spell comes in Wednesday night and freeze on Thursday. I've
spent 4 days moving orchids. It gives me a chance to perform riage.
Inspect, trim, spray (again) and move into my room. Brother-in-law is
in town working on his house... so Tim was a no-show. I did have more
time to make the move, but so far it has been on me.

Time consuming and tedious, but in the past we've had time to move the
plants by whole tables. Just roll them in, hitch-hikers and all. Like
a fool, I grow outdoors in the summer. Orchids love it, but it makes
them more complicated. One of these days I'l get my dream home... LOL
over that one. I'm dreaming over passive solar with a walk out on the
south side for my orchids.

2 nights of cold, then clear and back in the 70's days, 50's nights.
Damn, I hate Missouri. Too hot and dry this summer. The cymbidiums
willl stay out through this one, nexxt one will bring them inside.
Looks like they may be making spikes on most. I've got one that takes
a lot of cold nights, unfortunately, sometimes it gets too cold to
leave it out, so I spend a lot of time juggling with it. I miss
Alabama. The cyms could stay out most of the winter and had some
spectacular blooms.

I shouldn't complain. This is the first year that we haven't been
working on the room and moved all the plants lock,stock, and barrel at
the last minute. I've had several days to pick dead leaves from the
pots, trim back bulbs, drench and spray. Hopefully it will help. By
doing it alone am culling all growth that hangs down, and am limiting
the tropicals. Added more shelves and trays. Am able to spread the
orchids out a little more. Light through windows, hopefully will have
enough light with 2 and 3 shelves.

What a hoot. I've got some catts that don't want to grow or bloom
until they get urban sprawl. Time to repot, and the best growth was
when they went over the edge. Must be doing something wrong. Actually
am thinking of moving them all out of pots. Baskets or mounts. My
pots, mostly clear plastic were set in flats and some in cedar window
boxes. The catts grew over the sides and to the cedar. They didn't
like the plastic flats as well.

The tolumnia prionochilum on the new mounts had some mongo roots. I
pulled some vinca vine ( I think) and tied some of the keikeis to it.
They dug into those fuzzy vines like it felt like home. I was
impressed. It was the trunk of the vine that grows here with all the
aerial roots, pulled off the trees, and cut into 6" long pieces. Don't
know why I grow them. I usually lose half the spikes because they get
so darned long on such a tiny plant. My mother plant had 5 spikes this
year and all made it. She's outgrown her mount, am thinking about tying
it to a section of a larger piece of vine and seeing if it will work.
They are picky about the mount, but I've never seen them take to a
mount like that "furry vine". I think they are so cute.

Better close. I'm about 3 sheets and treating this like a blog. Hope
you don't mind, but there hasn't been much happening here lately. Kind
of miss it. Used to be some good discussions or hornery bitch
sessions, don't know which.

Nancy