Best way of keeping snapped orchid stem
 

Indoor orchid stem with five nice developing buds has accidentally just been
snapped off.

We have put it in a vase of water. Is it best to:

1. just change fresh water regularly
2. sprinkle a little phostrogen in the water
3. years ago i read putting in a couple of copper coins in the water was a
good idea?

Grateful for any advice on the above and any other suggestions. Thanks.

Best way of keeping snapped orchid stem
 

On Sun, 21 Apr 2013 11:57:44 +0100, "Dave West"
wrote:

Indoor orchid stem with five nice developing buds has accidentally just been
snapped off.

We have put it in a vase of water. Is it best to:

1. just change fresh water regularly
2. sprinkle a little phostrogen in the water
3. years ago i read putting in a couple of copper coins in the water was a
good idea?

Grateful for any advice on the above and any other suggestions. Thanks.


I did the same thing a few years ago. I put the stalk so it was
dangling in a tropical fresh water fish tank. The flowers opened but
the plant never grew any roots.

Steve

--
EasyNN-plus. Neural Networks plus. http://www.easynn.com
SwingNN. Forecast with Neural Networks. http://www.swingnn.com
JustNN. Just Neural Networks. http://www.justnn.com

Best way of keeping snapped orchid stem
 

On 21/04/2013 11:57, Dave West wrote:
Indoor orchid stem with five nice developing buds has accidentally just been
snapped off.

We have put it in a vase of water. Is it best to:

1. just change fresh water regularly
2. sprinkle a little phostrogen in the water
3. years ago i read putting in a couple of copper coins in the water was a
good idea?

Grateful for any advice on the above and any other suggestions. Thanks.

Treat it like any other cut flower, if you have one of those sachets of
cut flower food use that in the water, if not a few drips of bleach in
the water will stop the water going "Bad".
Looked after properly cut orchids can last up to 3 months, so worth
taking a little trouble.
When the stem broke did you get it straight into water?
If the cut stem was out of water for ah hour or more then it could help
to have a deep container of hand hot water and one of cold (It's final
vase is fine), shorten the stem by an inch or so and place it in the hot
water, stem only, not the flowers. leave it for half a min or so, then
move it into the cold water.
The hot water expands the water in the stem and will push out ant air
that has been taken up, then the cold water contracts the fluid in the
stem and gets drawn up into the stem.
I have known gerbra pushing out air for over a minute, you could see the
little stream of bubbles.
David @ a damp end of Swansea Bay, but waiting for the real rain.

Best way of keeping snapped orchid stem
 

On 21/04/2013 11:57, Dave West wrote:
Indoor orchid stem with five nice developing buds has accidentally just been
snapped off.

We have put it in a vase of water. Is it best to:

1. just change fresh water regularly
2. sprinkle a little phostrogen in the water
3. years ago i read putting in a couple of copper coins in the water was a
good idea?

Grateful for any advice on the above and any other suggestions. Thanks.

There is an outside chance that adding a small amount of aspirin will
accelerate the development of blooms and the feed sold for cut flowers
also helps. You probably also need to recut the stem cleanly underwater
with the sharpest knife you can find so that the capilliaries are not
airlocked. After that it is pot luck whether it will behave OK.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown