Paph "blushing" on crown
 

Hey all, I figured I'm not much of a beginner, although still learning. I just bought a paph supersuk x raisin pie and had a pretty rough ride home. The nursery is 3 hours away and so it experienced some sunburn on the leaves. I waited about 5 days after getting home to repot because the sphag was just wet and gross, and I'm glad I did because the nursery just potted up and the center was tightly packed.

Anyways, I know this guy is probably stressed out, but there's this "blush" that has come creeping up on the crown. Is that normal? All the photos I see online show minimal blush/redness, just green.

Thanks for your input

I think a picture would help, otherwise it's kind of hard to tell what it could be. :)

Ok ok, I know the drill, here are some photos :-)

[IMG]http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3822/8...a132374d_n.jpg IMG_20130601_095858 by Blehri, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3703/8...cebfec6a_n.jpg IMG_20130601_095848 by Blehri, on Flickr[/IMG]

The cut leaf is where the sunburn was, used hot/sterile scissors and dusted the end with cinnamon.

That maroon coloring on the undersides of the leaves is very typical for mottle leaved Paphs. Nothing to worry about.

BTW the registered name of your plant is Paph. Hsinying Alien.

Whew! This is my first paph and after the traumatic trip home I figured that was stress. So good to know that's it's just settling in.

So the tag says "Paph supersuk x raisin pie", that's just the cross right? So Paph. Hsinying Alien is the registered name?

Yes Supersuk and Raisin Pie are the parents. Hsinying Alien is the registered name of all the progeny from that cross.

Are you talking about the reddish blush on the underside of the leaves that comes up the stem? This is anthocyanin
pigmentation, the plants attempt at avoiding sunburn from UV radiation bouncing back up from the ground. Perhaps your plant was grown in higher light conditions than the pictures of others that you have seen.

By the way, while sunburnt leaves are unsightly it's not necessary to remove them. If the burnt spot was small I would have left it on (but that's a personal preference).

I am not sure if it is for UV protection, but it is natural pigmentation found in many paphs.
Many, if not all, coloratum and vini maudiae types develop on the backside of their leaves. Some have this coloring on the entire surface of the backside while most have it toward the base like the one shown in your photo.

By the way, when you describe red coloring is creeping up near the center, I was thinking bacterial rot got started, but if this wine coloring was what you were referring to, you don't need to worry as it is perfectly normal.
Also, I'm pretty sure it was already present, not just showing up all of sudden?

I used to have tons of these as they were so cheap and so common, and each plant is quite different.
So I used to buy a lot and dump out lots of ugly ones. I have kept about 4 that I liked.

They are strange in that the ones I really liked the flowers had too big of leaves and overall plant size, while smaller ones with beautiful leaves had ugly flowers. so I tossed many.
I still don't absolutely like what I have kept, but I kept them for either unique flowers or nice leaves to look at. haven't found ones yet with both nice leaves and flowers. that would be so nice, but I got tired of searching and spending money on them.

Enjoy~ :)

well what was interesting was the redness (referring to the wine color, not actual red) slowly creeped up the crown once I got it home. Or perhaps the more I looked at it the more I noticed it. The UV speculation is very interesting. I must admit that paphs aren't on my favorites list.....yet. but I did want to try my hand at these and I am really liking how unique they are! The bud looked extremely stressed out in that it was starting to lean forward like it was going to eventually fall offf.....BUT it has perked up. It is now on day 3 of it slowly opening and it's like torture. This guy is really making me pay for the trip home it endured :-)
The sunburnt leaf was pretty severe and was just afraid that some kind of infection would set in. The big black dot was mushy and had gone through the whole leaf....perhaps I shouldnt have acted so quickly in this case.

thank you so much for your advice, everyone. You've all made me realize that I could do something I never thought possible in this arid climate!

I wanna see pix when it blooms :)