Need advice on transferring from water culture to S/H

[camille1585]

I put a rootless and leafless Den in water culture in march, and now, about 6 months later there are plenty of new growths and nice roots. But it seems that it has reached the max amount of time to stay in the water, as some of the growths aren’t looking as nice and there’s a bit of mold attacking a cane.

I would like to transfer this plant to S/H since it is used to water, but do I still need to wait for new root growth before transferring? Anyone have experience with this type of transfer? After managing to save this little orchid (one of my favorites) I would hate to lose it due to a silly mistake!

[flyfishdoc]

I have never done this, but I would suggest that you wean the plant over by putting into S/H and water daily for a week or 2, then every other day for a week or then every 3 days then go to what you would otherwise. Ray has said you can't over water in S/H, and you came from water culture. Therefore, the worry of overwatering is not there.

Daily, or even twice daily watering for a few days, and tapering down, in my humble opinion, should let your plant adapt.

[Pilot]

Camille--

From my own personal experience-- I once had a phal that was potted in heavy organic soil-- the soil was drenched and apparently it had grown this way. When I transferred it to s/h, it didn't skip a beat-- the old roots simply sprang new shoots and the old roots remained green and vibrant. So I think if you go from a very wet pot to another fairly wet pot, your plant won't be adversely affected.

[Sun rm.N.E.]

Camille

When I transfered plants with moldy roots they were harder to treat in leca. As you know, a lot of rot producing microbes reproduce best with alternating dry and wet cycles so transferring them to S/H could help them. In fact, I started using water culture primarily to get rid of these, besides treating severe dehydration in rootless plants.

I have transferred well over a 100 plants from water culture to leca in the past 5 years, some into the S/H pots, but most using the solution in deep saucer method. I still flush as in S/H. Sometimes it takes a long time to establish the plants but long-term root health is remarkable on the plants that make it.

With new plants I find it hard to predict which will respond quickly to the transfer and I try to wait until there is at least a promise of new root growth, or the older roots are actively starting branching. I try not to injure the growing root tips with the leca while planting. However, healthy roots developed in water culture tend to live a lot longer in S/H than those developed in other media. Some show new branches soon, that are still functional a year later when I pot up. I have to add that I usually flush more than once a week and spray the top of the leca (not the plant) with pure water when it becomes dry because salt build up in my lower humidity environment has been the biggest killer of new root tips.

I treat all infections in water culture vigorously as long as there are visible signs. I change the solution in water culture about twice a week routinely and remove all senile roots and deeply diseased parts as soon as I have time. If there is infection I use a new container as well, after treatment. I use hydrogen peroxide and, now more frequently, Gentian Violet which seeps into the tissues and I found it to be the most effective so far. I will not use systemic fungicides in the house since research is implicating them in degenerative diseases like Parkinsons.

I hope this helps.