Pescatoria Lehmannii Culture

[dlkc]

Again, I picked an orchid on the fact that it would grow where I live, but was unable to find out about watering, light, or what to pot it in.

Thoughts?

Thanks again!

Danielle

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

Pescatorea like fairly high humidity (60% - 80%).

Intermediate to warm temperatures (55 F - 90 F).

Bright shade.

They have an unusual seasonal rain pattern they go by.

Wet season is during the summer months, but starts in the spring.

Rain tapers off a little in fall.

Winter gets some rain, but do not grow them very wet. If they're grown too wet, they will rot. They don't like to be grown very dry during this time either. During this time of year, you really gotta feel it out depending on where you're growing

Basically, it rains all year round, just much less during the winters and very heavily during the summers.

Do these conditions really sound like where you live?

The media has to be able to retain water well, but drain well too.

[Angurek]

King hit the nail on the head.

I'll also add that these plants are very disease-prone. You have to be careful not to water too late in the day because any water sitting in the leaf axils will cause bacterial or fungal rot to establish. They're also really hard to bring back to health if they succumb; once they're sick, they tend to get sulky.

I've found lehmannii to be one the slightly more difficult species in this genus. If you wanna start out with this genus, try P. cerina or P. dayana. Even though they're not as showy as lehmannii, they're more tolerant of poor conditions.

By the way, the genus name is spelled "Pescatorea," not "Pescatoria."