Terrestrial Orchid Forum :: Last posts

this 8 months protocorms (12 mm) were transferred direct into Neudohum. Transfer into another sterile Gel medium had no success.

http://www.bildercache.de/bild/20080507-155505-305.jpg

I've heard about this before, but it is very good to see it illustrated. I've also read about as a method to increase Ophrys. I think I'll do an experiment on some Dactylorhiza this summer, just to try. In general, my Dactylorhiza multiply fine by themselves, but on other orchids it might be useful.

Kind regards

I was not successful with this species in Germany. The problem seems to be the same as with the european Ceph. damasonium and turkish Ceph. curdica.
All this species should have enough leave green to support themselves with power but they have no mechanism to protect themselves against "bad" fungi and microorganisms (so they rot). For that they need fungi partners. I thing if your are able to cultivate the plants in a very clean surrounding you shouldn't need the fungi. May be Neudohum is doing well also.

Greetings Bertholdii

Hey Berthold,

I can't claim that these are going to make it for the long term. Being native in the nearby mountains, I supposed they have a better chance of surviving. The soil fungi/bacteria are very aggressive in southern Japan and I've lost a number of plants to all kinds of rots including rhododendrons, numerous orchids (Pogonia for example is very prone), and roses. I don't use inorganic fertilizer in the open garden except in very dilute quantities and in very small volumes (usually from a bottle sprayer). I never use inorganic fertilizer on terrestrial orchids except for ones in pots, and then I use very mild dilutions. Plants in the outdoor beds are given only organic fertilizer, and with the exception of Calanthe, they get just a little.

Keeping the plants in a very clean environment is challenging in the out doors. I had a talk with Holger Perner about this and he feels that the use of fungicides on a routine basis is the best thing to do. He went so far as to say that if you don't use them eventually you will lose your plants to rot. Thoughts?

KCii

Keith

I look forward in anticipation to you report in the HOS Very Happy

With the orchids that prefer a more free draining mixture (orchis, orphys) do you open the soil structure up with added grit?

I tested with a 50% Perlite mixture. The effect is that you reduce the nutrients not more. If you want turbo tubers take it straight.
The protection effect of the pure Neudohum stands for about 5 months. If you repot in October its good enough for the growing season until May, then I keep the plant completely dry and repot again in October.
The outdoor garden application of Neudohum is not yet tested well. That are completely different conditions. I am testing with 20% Neudohum and 80 % Perlite.

still the main food at the salep market in Mugla, Turkey:

http://www.bildercache.de/bild/20080429-203706-793.jpg

the odd congora orchid

you mean Gongora?

Nearly all orchids with green leaves don't need fungi for alimentation. They are completely self supporting. Some need fungi for protection against bad fungi and microorganisms.

OK, so they don't risk death when they loose the symbiont. Then why do they risk loosing a good protection. That's still a great loss. And even if the plant is self-supporting, the fungus gives it additional energy which shouldn't be wasted even if it's not needed to survive.

And what if it only seems to you that the contact is lost between plant and fungus in symbiotic culture? The fungus may still be there hidden in the roots, maybe not as active as before. I replated well-grown seedlings of an epiphytic orchid (asymbiotic culture) to a medium with 20g/l sugar and with 7.5g/l sugar. All seedlings were green and had a few leaves. They were kept under 16h photoperiod. Seedlings on the 20g/l medium grow quickly, while all seedlings on the 7.5g/l medium died after a few weeks. So they weren't self-supporting at all. They depended on high amounts of external energy, no matter how green they were.

If you sow asymbiotic in vitro the orchid doesn't see a fungus in it's whole life.

That's not really true if you think about all the nutrients in the medium. In fact for the plants it seems that thea are in constant contact with their fungus: the medium itself is a simulation of the symbiont, an artificial copy of the real fungus if you like it that way. There are vitamins, amino acids, sugar and many other things that can not be found in the soil. For the seedling it surely seems as if a real fungus is there all the time, and the beneficial effects are all the same. When seedlings grow in asymbiotic culture it doesn't mean that they can live without a fungus and are self-supporting. They still depend in external help, and we do our best to make them belive that a symbiont is there.

You could argue that the rotting remains sit close to the plant and eventually serves as fertiliser ...

If the plant has nutrients in a tuber, why would it release them into the soil for other plants to have, if it could keep it all for itself? Let us assume that you have a bag of gold coins and you go to sleep. Would you scatter the coins around your house thinking 'how good it will be next morning to find some remaining gold around, that others did not find during the night'? For my part I would keep my gold in my bag while I sleep to have them all for myself in the morning.

Maybe I should drop the notion of the tuber as a seperate organ - if you look at it as an inflated root it makes more sense: roots drop annually, so the tuber should, too ... I can live with that.

If the tuber is a modified root, that doesn't mean it has to behave like a root since it is modified. It is different and it may behave differently, as part of its modified functions, if that is beneficial for the plant.

I think there must be some other reason for the rotting of the old tuber. I've been thinking about this, but I couldn't come up with anything logical. I could easily argue against all my ideas, so finally I thought that loosing the old tuber is a stupid thing and a great mistake for the part of the orchid. The size of one tuber is genetically coded and so it is maximized. After reaching the limit for the size of a tuber, the plant could only increase in strength if it could have more tubers. Having a few tubers from previous years and using them to store water could give better chance to survive the dry season. In nature many plants do not flower every year because they're not strong enough. If they had 'more room' to store nutrients than one tuber only at a time, they could gather some extra starch in a good season and use it later to flower in a bad season. Surrendering this possibility doesn't seem to be logical to me.

Thanks Fred

by the way, my name is Jaime.

Hi

Better still, use 'orchid propagation protocorm filetype:pdf', in that way what appears is only files in pdf format.

Here is where it is http://www.lowermillestate.com/index.html

Hi there,

welcome to the forum, and good luck with your hunt for seeds.

regards,
Fred

Hi Bo,
I am interested in a test of Orchis punctulata sowing.
Orchis caucasica could be difficult because it's close to purpurea. Orchis spitzelii and Him. caprinum is easy to germinate but spitzelii is very sensitive against rotting after deflasking.
Greetings Berthold

Fred it was an undirected trial just to trace for mycorrhiza fungi in the neighborhood.
I don't know if the growing speed is typical for this species but I think most species can reach flowering size within the 3. year under good conditions and don't reach flowering size within 8 years under bad conditions
Greet Bertholdii

Hi Bertholdii (quite funny what the spellcheck did to your name Very Happy

),
the seedlings will stay in the glass until the leaves are withered away and a new sprout occurs, at least that's what I planed. We will see if the tuber will make it.

Greetings
volzotan

Tassos,
I leave the tubers in the pot until September outdoors in the shadow and rain protected in the very dry soil and then repot them.
Greetings Berthold

Last year we had one of the hottest springs going, this week last year the temperature was in the mid 20s. The weather this year is more like an average year.

Same here: all picture I come across have plants grouped in clusters of 5 to 30 plants. I don't find any reference to "stem-oriented organs" in literature - I smell a paper, Frank.

Secondly, I don't know if this is coincidence or not but all photographs of plants in clusters I found have the flowers oriented in the same direction (e.g. the one I posted earlier in this thread). Are there cases of phototaxis of the flower in Orchidaceae ?

Rob, I keep it in the cold greenhouse all over the year. Minimum in winter is 4°C. It grows from November until May similar to the mediterranean orchids. I start watering when I see the sprout and stop watering when leaves turn brown. But the secret is the soil which excuses overwatering so you have no rotting at the underground part of the plant at a high rate of nutrients.

Interesting Neal. Most things seem spot on here in southern Japan. Here's C. formosanum doing its thing:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v164/tvelardi/CformosanumWHPL08.jpg

KC

Besides the discussion about the B1 fungus, I also have grown certain seedlings of Dactylorhiza species on it. Volzotan, I am one year in front of you with Dact. nieschalkiorum, saccifera, foliosa and iberica. Here are the nieschalkiorums which started to grow a few weeks ago:

http://www.ewetel.net/~frank.meissner2/Homepage/Dnieschalkiorum13.jpg

saccifera is even bigger at this time, iberica only a very few and slowly, foliosa grows like a weed but is later.

Here the real Shantung ibrid

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v111/Rino1/Orchids/Pleioneshantung1.jpg

Another variety of Pleione Shantung

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v111/Rino1/Orchids/Pleioneshantunggoldenplower2.jpg

if you whant to see more picture
http://www.gardentalking.it/bbforum/viewforum.php?f=4

Here picture form my new Pleione blooming

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v111/Rino1/Orchids/Pleionebulbocoides1.jpg

In Germany the flowering season is definitely late. Orchis mascula has some buds, but until now no inclination to flower.

But better late than nothing - have just heard from a Cyprus trip that there was a very dry winter there and a spring with much less orchids than normal.

Let's wait and see. It's fine that nature has no strict timetable Laughing