Potting oncostele- too much seramis?

[reptilegrrl]

I need some n00b reassurance. I bought a very large oncostele Midnight Miracle 'Masai Red" at TJ's. It had 10 PBs and though it was deeply pot-bound, it had many many live or viable roots. (Although some of the roots were a little soft and will probably die in the future, in my experience it's better to leave them on while they are still alive and functioning, rather than cut them off when repotting.)

It was in a tall 4-inch pot, but when I pulled it out, it expanded an inch all around. Then when I cleaned, soaked, and untangled the roots, it was too big for my largest orchid pot, a 5.75" plastic pot. I needed to improvise, so I bought an acrylic serving bowl at Target and drilled drainage and ventilation holes in it. The bowl is a little bigger than ideal, about but I was in a bind and needed to get this thing in a pot, it has a lot of PBs and a lot of roots and it was very thirsty as a bare root plant. The roots do fill most of the bowl.

I read that this plant is a heavy drinker and likes a lot of moisture. So I potted it in a combination of seramis clay granules and red lava rock. Seramis because it stays wet for a long time. Lava rock because in my experience seramis can smother roots by creating a too-wet situation, and because these roots are not tiny, they are almost like a phal's roots. My hope is that the lava rock will create airy places inside the bowl- I know it also absorbs water, but not as much as the seramis, so my thought it that the seramis will pull water from the lava rock.

But I am second-guessing myself. I am super-worried about smothering this plant's roots and rotting them. The oldest PBs are a little shrunken since repotting. (I did find a lot of very dead roots on the oldest pbs and those were pulled off during repot. The oldest pb also popped off when I tugged a root so I have potted it up alone and am hoping it will propagate.) I posted a picture in the galleries. You can't really see much of the lava rock, because seramis fills every gap everywhere, but here's the general breakdown: the root volume takes up about half the total volume of the bowl, then the lava rock is about 1/4 the volume of the bowl, and then the seramis is the rest. But if you know seramis, you know that it fills spaces pretty tightly.

My environment: these are windowsill plants in my living room. They get northern light all day (bright shade), strong western light in the afternoon, and have an Ikea vaxer bulb directly over the Masai Red. The typical temp is 77-80' (central AC) and there is a ceiling fan on during most days, but I usually shut it off at night to give the orchids increased humidity (there is still air circulation, as we have AC and high ceilings.) The typical humidity is 48% but I mist all the orchids about 3x a day, which raises the humidity from the high 50s to the low 70s.

I really like this orchid, it is enormous and has big fat PBs and 3 spikes. I really don't want to mess it up by rotting its roots.

Thanks for any advice you can offer!

[reptilegrrl]

Let's see if I can post this pic:

[fishmom]

I am not familiar with Seramis, so I don't have an informed opinion. However, it looks like the drainage holes in the bottom of the new pot are minimal. Does the water run through the pot freely? Does it begin to dry out in a reasonable amount of time compared to what you had before?

If you feel you need to get more air to the roots, you might try inverting a small pot, or just the bottom half of a small pot, in the bottom of your new container. By adding a few more holes in the clear pot, you will insure that air is getting to the center of the root mass.

[reptilegrrl]

Yeah, water runs through and out very easily. All of the holes drain water, including and there are 4 holes where the side meets the bottom, so it can drain even when sitting on a flat surface.

This is the first time I have ever potted this orchid, and it was pot-bound in peat/perlite before. So no way to compare. There's really no room for anything in the center of the pot, the plant is quite large and anything put underneath it would push it up and out of the pot.

It does drain very easily and i can see some air gaps at the sides of the pot, I hope that means that air can move through the pot. we'll see how long it takes to get dry, I suppose.

[reptilegrrl]

Just a lil update: the plant is drinking heavily, but showing some signs of dehydration. Some shriveling of PBs. Buds are still developing though. It has SO MANY PBs and roots that I am sure it will survive, but I do hate to see shriveled PBs.

[Mountaineer370]

I have one of these, and I can vouch for the fact it is a heavy drinker! Towards the end of summer, beginning of fall, I noticed the p-bulbs on mine were shriveling. I upped the watering to about every other day or every third day, and I can honestly say they seem to be plumping back up, something I didn't think they did once they shriveled.

I can't help with any advice about your potting medium. I have no experience with either Seramis or lava rock. Mine is in 2/3 small fir bark and 1/3 Hydroton. Like fishmom, though, I was wondering if your pot has enough -- or big enough -- drainage holes. Even if water is going through easily, I'm wondering if the plant is getting enough air to the root system.

You're going to love the beautiful dark red flowers!

[estación seca]

It also depends on the relative humidity in your growing space. If it's lower than what the plant experienced at the grower's greenhouse, the plant will need more water than it had at the growers' greenhouse.

If some roots have been damaged it may not be able to take up enough water to support the pseudobulbs in the style to which they have become accustomed.

When I get a plant like this I am more concerned the new growths look good. I know the old growths will complain about the change in scenery.

[reptilegrrl]

Originally Posted by Mountaineer370

I have one of these, and I can vouch for the fact it is a heavy drinker! Towards the end of summer, beginning of fall, I noticed the p-bulbs on mine were shriveling. I upped the watering to about every other day or every third day, and I can honestly say they seem to be plumping back up, something I didn't think they did once they shriveled.

I can't help with any advice about your potting medium. I have no experience with either Seramis or lava rock. Mine is in 2/3 small fir bark and 1/3 Hydroton. Like fishmom, though, I was wondering if your pot has enough -- or big enough -- drainage holes. Even if water is going through easily, I'm wondering if the plant is getting enough air to the root system.

You're going to love the beautiful dark red flowers!

Thanks for sharing that experience! Lava rock is like an open-cell sponge, it is full of voids. Plus I figure that as the plant absorbs the water or it evaporated, air is pulled in through the holes to take its place. I can also see some voids inside the pot. If I start to see a lot of root death I will reconsider, but basically, the holes are just like those in all of my other pots, they are 5mm. I also removed the top-dressing from the center of the pot so it can dry more evenly.

I watered it Sunday and today the excess water is gone so I think I will water it tonight or in the morning (the media is still damp and the roots that are above the media are also wet.) You can't let seramis get completely dry or it will desiccate the roots.

[reptilegrrl]

I ended up unpotting it and putting it back into the same pot, with less seramis and more lava rock. It had had some root death, but a lot of the roots were in bad shape already, so I think those probably would have died anyway. No mold or rot. There are new root buds and new growths appearing, as well as a new spike growing, one spike about to bloom, and a small branch on the oldest spike is producing some new blooms as well.

In the process of the repot I confirmed my suspicion that it's actually two separate plants, not one. I put them back in the pot together anyway because it looks quite impressive and they appear to have been growing together for years.

It does seem to need watering within 3 days, so I watered it again today and might step up that frequency if necessary.