Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp and
cold Washington DC area)

Just looked in the rgo archives and found this entertaining thread from 1999
with subject "Funny Stories"
http://www.google.com/groups?threadm... cca.home.com
Enjoy!

Having only been into orchids for 3 years my worst story is not as bad as
many of yours probably:

I got my first orchid (a classic white Phal) as a wedding present from my
father (on April 28th 2001 ... hmm, wedding anniversary coming up soon ...
another opportunity to get more orchids, yay :-) Anyway, just a couple of
weeks after getting this Phal, I was raising the blinds in the morning to
let in the sunlight for the plant, and the entire blinds came out of the
fixture and tumbling down onto the plant. The leaves were seriously scarred,
the spike was mangled, not a single blossom to save. My first reaction was
shock, my second reaction: I have to go buy another orchid just like it, so
that if my dad asks "How is the orchid?" I can say that "It's flowering
beautifully" without lying. At that point I had no clue about the scale of
this disaster, I actually thought that the plant might be in danger of not
surviving this occurrence -- foolish me! So I went out and bought my second
Phal which does indeed look very much like the first -- and right now both
of them are in gorgeous bloom. It's the second time that they are both
reblooming under my care, and one of them has had a keiki in the meantime as
well ... I believe it was the second one I got, but I can't really be sure,
since I keep having trouble telling them apart.

Joanna

"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp
and
cold Washington DC area)

My worst disaster: a greenhouse heater and alarm failure that came together on a 7°F night.

Literally everything in the greenhouse - a 20-year collection of orchids from around the world, many
of which were irreplaceable plants I had personally collected in South America and China - froze,
then turned into rotting mush when the sun came up and warmed the GH.

Associated sub-disaster: As everything was catalogued, I was able to put together a fairly complete
list of replacement values, as they were covered under my homeowners insurance. I called the
company and was immediately asked if it was vandalism. Being an honest guy, I answered "No, it was
a heater failure." The response. "We don't cover freezing. Thanks for your honesty. Goodbye."

Associated lesson: don't be honest with insurance companies..... A "Yes" and a quick door kick
would have resulted in the issuance of a fat check.

Associated positive: After buying a new heater and alarm system, I wrote them off on my income
taxes as a "business expense," not having the slightest idea how I'd make a business out of this. A
few months later that year, I had divisions of recently-acquired plants, posted a message right here
about their availability, had two "orders" within a few hours. Voila' - First Rays was born.

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

.. . . . . . . . . . .
"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Just looked in the rgo archives and found this entertaining thread from 1999
with subject "Funny Stories"
http://www.google.com/groups?threadm... cca.home.com
Enjoy!

Having only been into orchids for 3 years my worst story is not as bad as
many of yours probably:

I got my first orchid (a classic white Phal) as a wedding present from my
father (on April 28th 2001 ... hmm, wedding anniversary coming up soon ...
another opportunity to get more orchids, yay :-) Anyway, just a couple of
weeks after getting this Phal, I was raising the blinds in the morning to
let in the sunlight for the plant, and the entire blinds came out of the
fixture and tumbling down onto the plant. The leaves were seriously scarred,
the spike was mangled, not a single blossom to save. My first reaction was
shock, my second reaction: I have to go buy another orchid just like it, so
that if my dad asks "How is the orchid?" I can say that "It's flowering
beautifully" without lying. At that point I had no clue about the scale of
this disaster, I actually thought that the plant might be in danger of not
surviving this occurrence -- foolish me! So I went out and bought my second
Phal which does indeed look very much like the first -- and right now both
of them are in gorgeous bloom. It's the second time that they are both
reblooming under my care, and one of them has had a keiki in the meantime as
well ... I believe it was the second one I got, but I can't really be sure,
since I keep having trouble telling them apart.

Joanna

"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp
and
cold Washington DC area)

"J Fortuna" wrote in message .. .
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

I used to buy out of bloom plants from Home Depot, Lowes, produce
stores, etc. I was doing to have mnore plants, and also to have some
available to give as gifts. Unfortunately, one turned out to be a
critter factory, and decimated my collection. I grow indoors, so I
couldn't really resort to chemicals. I could not get it under
control, and had to get rid of all my plants.

Moral of the story: quarantine all new acquistions!

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp and
cold Washington DC area)

I finished my taxes Monday night. The have been done for a few weeks,
but I just wrote out the checks, and did my local business taxes. To
top it all off, my backyard is almost completely under water.

--Matt

Subject: Worst Disasters and Best Miracles
From: "J Fortuna"
Date: 4/13/2004 9:14 PM Central Daylight Time
Message-id:

Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp and
cold Washington DC area)




Worst disaster: ordering from Lee's Botanical Gardens. Cheap plants, and free
aphids.

biggest miracle... My parents actually getting the Cypripedium I got them
established in their bog garden.

-

theoneflasehaddock

Good grief, Ray, even though I remember that story I still get chills when
you tell it. Of course, without the disaster, we wouldn't have First Rays,
and that WOULD be a disaster!

Diana

My latest so-called disaster occured today, when I snapped a multi-branched
spike off of a multi-spiked Phal that was destined to go to a show next
week. The flowers were so perfect - I had high hopes, but alas, the spike
sits in a cruet of water, and the rest of the flowers will never make it
out.

That is not the worst thing that can happen, so I'm going to share one that
happened to some friends two days ago. We've had a lot of wind down here in
south FL, and Monday night/Tuesday morning brought a big time blow. We, as
our friends, live on a "greenbelt", which simply means a 100' minor canal.
In our case there is a lot of brush and many trees, so we have a bit of a
wind break. The rain was blowing so hard that we'd moved the Phals under
more cover to prevent them from getting soaked overnight. But none of us
anticipated how hard the winds would blow.

Still, at 5AM we were up and listening to the wind. Suddenly, we heard that
awful "train's coming" tornado sound, and we were prepared to hit the
walk-in closet with the cat, but it died down. At 5:45 we were outside, and
the only damage we incurred was to an Oncidium which fell from a pot clip.
Didn't even snap its spikes.

Our friends, on the other hand, who have a showplace that includes a pond,
meandering paths, orchids much more mature than ours (many specimens), etc,
were not so lucky. There green belt is completely open. The winds blew
through there, knocking over their Vanda support stand and snapping several
plants, kicking over an award winning Dendrobium, really wreaking havoc.
Judy recounted how she called to her husband, "Save the show plants
first!!". She said the entire area was covered with "orchid bits". Today,
she is calmer, and it's not as bad as it seemed, but they really sustained
some damage.

Scary.

Diana

It's been quite a few years now, but I don't think I'll ever forget the
night when, back when we were still in the backyard, I went to bed on a
weather report that predicted a low of 49F -- nothing to worry about, for my
personal collection, even if the forecasters were off by 5 degrees [the
margin of error we expect]. Woke up the next morning, well after sunrise,
to find a temp of 37F on the porch [unheated, but sheltered on all sides
except south]. I'm sure it was colder during the night, and esp. out in the
actual yard and open shadehouse. I lost only a few of the most tender
plants; others were set back, and many were thrown off their blooming
schedules for a couple-three years, but almost all eventually recovered.

More recently, about 4-5 years ago, our water treatment system here at the
nursery malfunctioned -- I have never gotten a satisfactory explanation, so
I don't know exactly WHAT it sprayed on the plants. But whatever it was, I
don't think there was a plant in the place that escaped having some or all
of its root tips burned off. The losses were bigger on that one
[proportionally, not just because we had more plants]. But more survived
than I had expected, so I didn't have to file that Chapter 7 bankruptcy
petition I was working on ... [And we now have an RO system that we're very
happy with.]
--
Kenni Judd
Juno Beach Orchids
http://www.jborchids.com


"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp
and
cold Washington DC area)

I second that!

"Diana Kulaga" wrote in message
ink.net...
Good grief, Ray, even though I remember that story I still get chills when
you tell it. Of course, without the disaster, we wouldn't have First
Rays,
and that WOULD be a disaster!

Diana

About the same time as you describe, we were in Singapore. We left our
greenhouse to a dripper system and a timer to water the plants. It seems the
diaphragm on the timer failed and water was pumped into the yard. The flood
caused a power outage, and temperatures got down into the 32 degree range inside
the greenhouse. I lost quite a few plants; however, Mick's Neofinetia falcatas
deflasked seedlings fairlywell. I lost only a few of them.

.. . . Pam
Everything Orchid Management System http://www.pe.net/~profpam/page3.html
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kenni Judd wrote:

It's been quite a few years now, but I don't think I'll ever forget the
night when, back when we were still in the backyard, I went to bed on a
weather report that predicted a low of 49F -- nothing to worry about, for my
personal collection, even if the forecasters were off by 5 degrees [the
margin of error we expect]. Woke up the next morning, well after sunrise,
to find a temp of 37F on the porch [unheated, but sheltered on all sides
except south]. I'm sure it was colder during the night, and esp. out in the
actual yard and open shadehouse. I lost only a few of the most tender
plants; others were set back, and many were thrown off their blooming
schedules for a couple-three years, but almost all eventually recovered.

More recently, about 4-5 years ago, our water treatment system here at the
nursery malfunctioned -- I have never gotten a satisfactory explanation, so
I don't know exactly WHAT it sprayed on the plants. But whatever it was, I
don't think there was a plant in the place that escaped having some or all
of its root tips burned off. The losses were bigger on that one
[proportionally, not just because we had more plants]. But more survived
than I had expected, so I didn't have to file that Chapter 7 bankruptcy
petition I was working on ... [And we now have an RO system that we're very
happy with.]
--
Kenni Judd
Juno Beach Orchids
http://www.jborchids.com

"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

Joanna (who is fighting a head-cold and procrastinating on taxes in damp
and
cold Washington DC area)

I had a Stanhopia that had the leaves turn black while all the psudobulbs
got brown and mushy. Nothing I tried seemed to help and after a month or so,
I finally wrote it off as a loss. At the time, I lived in New Orleans and
had a clump of banana trees in my yard. I tossed the orchid under the trees
and forgot about it. About a year later, I was clearing out the banana
plants to make room for a garden and there, growing among the dead leaves
and other mulch, was the Stanhopia. It had somehow survived the "rot", a
freeze over the winter (rare for NOLA) and periods of up to a month without
rain/water. Plus, the assortment of insect and animal pests that usually
enjoy my orchids had managed to overlook it. In fact, not only had my
Stanhopia survived, but it had a half dozen new leaves and several new
growths. That was about 8 years ago and I still have that plant.

Bob C.


"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?

I had a Stanhopia that had the leaves turn black while all the psudobulbs
got brown and mushy. Nothing I tried seemed to help and after a month or so,
I finally wrote it off as a loss. At the time, I lived in New Orleans and
had a clump of banana trees in my yard. I tossed the orchid under the trees
and forgot about it. About a year later, I was clearing out the banana
plants to make room for a garden and there, growing among the dead leaves
and other mulch, was the Stanhopia. It had somehow survived the "rot", a
freeze over the winter (rare for NOLA) and periods of up to a month without
rain/water. Plus, the assortment of insect and animal pests that usually
enjoy my orchids had managed to overlook it. In fact, not only had my
Stanhopia survived, but it had a half dozen new leaves and several new
growths. That was about 8 years ago and I still have that plant.

Bob C.


"J Fortuna" wrote in message
...
Anyone care to share stories about worst orchid-related disasters and/or
best orchid-related miracles? Or any other entertaining orchid stories for
that matter?