When to re-pot my new Shelob Tolkien?

[MisterGuy]

Originally Posted by Keithj

These posts contradict what I’ve read that orchids don’t like wet feet. Is it only members of the Oncidium tribe that this applies to?

Keith

I am absolutely not an expert, but I believe it's been fairly conclusively demonstrated, when it comes to orchids, the phrase "likes to dry out" may be more easily interpreted as "drowns or rots easily", and literally all orchids will do well naturally with aerated, clean water dampening them if the orchid is in the higher end of it's maximum growing conditions. It seems as though lots of orchids just either have really tough to maintain "natural" maximum growing conditions so wet roots will make them lose to fungal infections, or they flower better if their hormones are allowed to concentrate through growth restriction, so they need to dry out in "natural" conditions but can be induced to flower in artificial environments through flushing nitrogen.

I hope that's stated with enough caveats as to not bring down wrath at the generalizations.

[Keithj]

Bearing in mind the comments about keeping it damp because it’s so pot-bound I’ve been standing it on damp aquarium gravel and the moisture is wicking to the surface. At the moment it seems happy enough. The second largest spike is progressing nicely and the brown spotting on what’s currently the inside of the bud is showing through the closed sepals. The open flowers when I bought the plant have been distorted by the plastic sleeve it came in so I’m looking forward to seeing flowers from this spike that are in their prime before much longer.

Thanks for the interest.

Keith