oncidium sharry baby repot and a snail (?)
 

hey all,

so, been thinking about repotting the sharry baby we got shortly ago. it dropped flowers, so it’s time to repot and get it out of the nursery mix. ive read that black spots can be part of it with these, so while they don’t look great, and there’s a lot, it’s sort of a waiting game on those... (?) but looking closely at it today, it’s kinda not looking so good close up! and i saw an insect! please advise....is this one of the snails we should watch out for? kinda nervous a little bout that actually. thanks for any input....

edit: the snail is visible center pic 1. it’s pretty small...

Water your plant with diluted coffee (expresso, preferably). Then, prepare another for you and relax. Snails will go away.:)

ha, ok, great, thanks! ive always occasionaly sprinkled a few coffee grounds as a top dressing to reduce/control fungus gnats, but never watering with coffee! this forum is great, and sounds like as good a plan as any! thanks again, i won’t stress then:roll:

Acutally, I was informed that regular coffee was not strong enough, and you would need a concentrated coffee to make a difference.

Not sure which is right.

What do you mean by "regular coffee"?

I think so. I think it is one of those 'bush snail' types. I don't get snails and slugs here - but have certainly seen snails in the pot of an incoming shipped orchid from down south. Rare case only. But have seen it. I ordered "sluggo" - but don't use it. I keep it on-hand ----- just in case.

The other method is 'coffee grounds'. So can look up 'coffee grounds orchids snails' on google.

Coffee as brewed in the US resembles European espresso as a distant memory resembles a first love.

You can look up caffeine content of various brews. I am always on the lookout for marked-down ground coffee. I brew it twice as strong as usual and let it cool. I water the plants well so the roots don't take up much coffee. Then I water them with coffee, soaking the root ball. I water again with plain water before they go dry. Some people have found coffee kills orchid roots. I think it's more likely when the roots are dry.

As for spots... lots of Oncs have this kind. Don't worry.

As for repotting... as soon as it begins making a new growth. Use a pot 4-8cm larger in diameter than the current one. Sharry is a very big girl who grows fast.

Probably about the strength of a normal cup (by American standards) of instant like Sanka (if you like that one - I don't), but needs to be about 4 times as strong. To ensure you get most of the nooks and crannies where those tiny buggers hide, you may need to soak it.

hey all, thank you for the delicious discussion...i am pondering it now over a warm cuppa.

so as a follow up, we watched a few of the orchid girl vids on utube, and she made it seem like if u see one snail soon they will be in every plant and kill everything. but im not getting that vibe from this thread. we will repot tonight and see what we see, and give it a good coffe drink this weekend. but basically they aren’t as bad as it seems?