How tightly do you pack your medium?
 

I went to an orchid repotting class and was shocked when the instructor was pushing so roughly, shoving the media in! I understand a little light push, but WOW!

So, I'm curious how roughly/tightly you pack media in with your orchid.

In her defense, she did say that orchids like phal's and paph's she did not shove quite so abruptly with as their tend to be less roots than with oncidiums and other orchids, and they tend to be far more fragile.

I guess I am whimpy. I don't pack it very hard at all. I tend to tap the pot on the table to settle it then lightly push down on the top. When I use sphag, I don't want it packed really tight so I use a pencil or something to lightly push it between the roots.

when i do sphag its different. but with bark, i pack pretty hard. and try to fit then in all the places i can. nobody has died yet, at least not for that reason. i hate wobbly plants, and they cant establish when wobbly. its even worse when a plant falls out from lose media

I don't pack very hard but I use the blunt end of a split bamboo stake to push medium down into open spaces. My goal is to not have open spaces within the medium. Other than that my medium is pretty loose.

I pack fairly hard so as not to have a loose, wobbly plant otherwise you'll need a ton of support to stop the plant from falling over, especially if it's a large catt or laelia etc. A loose plant will take weeks longer to take hold of it's container and medium.

catts and the type i pack really pretty hard, onc less hard, and paphs and phals get shaken down bark and they are more or less on thier own to tighten up.....

With my Phals and Catts I pack the plants fairly heavey with the bark mix that I use. In a plastic pot after I am done repotting I should be able to lift the plant by the leaves and the plant should stay in the pot. One of the main reasons you want the bark medea tight is so the plant will stay standing on its own.

For those who pack so hard and tight, aren't you afraid of breaking roots?? I just can't do it:shock:

Now see, silken, that's exactly what I thought. In fact, the lady who taught the class started off by telling us a story of one lady who attended her class that gasped and begged her to stop in fear that she was hurting the orchid! In all fairness, she did warn us, lol... But still, I heard some gasping going on in the room.

Again, in her defense, she is the caretaker and manager for the orchids in our botanical gardens so I would assume she knows what she's doing or she wouldn't be there to begin with.

I've taken her advice today as I repotted all of my orchids into new plastic pots. However, on several (especially phal's and paph's as per her advice) I found myself not able to be as rough. I guess we will see what happens!

im not as rough with phals as catts. the catts can handle it. i start out gently, but them i get ticked off and start going hard :P i start by gently getting as much media as i can, then i go into the places where there are no surface roots and press hard. then add new pieces one at a time into the crevice i made