In article m,
"PhalGuy" wrote:

Hello everyone!

Is it me or it`s been very quiet here this week?
Maybe, we all are busy with spring cleaning, repotting, etc....



um, ok, for your amusement: repotted three and half phals (3 adults,
one seedling) in spagh and plastic pots this past week, 2 in bloom; the
one with two spikes was in sphag and pushing itself out of its pot, and
i figured if i waited for it to go out of bloom it wouldn't get
repotted til it was on the floor. other three were in bark and clay
pots. 2 not doing well, one blooming and otherwise not doing great.
figured it couldn't hurt to repot, and everything else in sphag is doing
well, so i thought "what the heck."

so i worked myself into a pretzel to unpot the one with two blooming
spikes wihout breaking them, and when i got it out it looked like there
was actually plenty of room in the pot...? it was only half full of
roots, but by then it was too late, so i stuffed it into the next size
up.

knocked the bark out of the two adults and peeled their roots off the
pots, fully expecting a rotten mass under the bark--nope, great roots in
the bark. ??? well of course, by then the bark was in the trash with
the pizza box and there was nothing to do but stuff them into new pots
too.

the seedling had done *nothing* for at least a year; i pulled that
out--same deal, great roots. by then i'd blown something like 2 hours
and wrought havoc in the kitchen and was getting irritated. so i stuck
it in sphag and figured "ok well i may have killed all of 'em but one
was cheap and 2 were free so i guess it's ok."

the good news is that after four days i have no bud blast and only two
flowers falling off (and they're the two oldest on the spike) and the
leaves are all nice and firm, so here's hoping to the orchid goddess
(your sacrificial yam is in the mail) that i haven't destroyed any of
them.

so that was my exciting orchid event.

oh, repotted a vuyl too--it was in OASIS under the bark--!! it was a
gift and pretty expensive so i'm wringing my hands over that one, but it
doesn't seem to be suffering any ill effects--when it comes time to
divide it i'll have to have someone else do it (hi Al 'cause i'm
afraid to touch it.

--j_a