Adaptation and transplantation
Once the orchid has been brought from the store, there are some steps to be taken to adapt it. This flower is very sensitive to the slightest movement and can shed its buds or start to fade.
First of all, the "newcomer" needs quarantine. A pot with such a plant should be kept separate from other indoor flowers for 2 weeks. It is undesirable to leave it on a windowsill with constant direct sunlight; it is better to give preference to places where the light is diffused. You can place the flower at a distance from the window - on a bedside table or table.
During adaptation, do not feed or water the orchid. There is no need to replant the plant immediately, since the substrate from the store is rich in nutrients and can last up to 2 years after planting. It is necessary to transplant only if the flower was planted in sphagnum in the store
It is important to monitor the condition of the flower in order to timely identify and eliminate diseases and pests. However, for prophylactic purposes, it is not necessary to treat it with antiparasitic agents, as this may turn out to be additional stress.
Protection against diseases and pests
Most often, the plant is more or more exposed to the invasion of pests, subject to improper care.
With excessive soil moisture, rot can form on the roots. Its appearance can be determined by the fact that the foliage becomes flabby and turns yellow. To get rid of rot, the plant should reduce watering. If the process is neglected, you can transplant the flower into new soil.
A spider mite can infect a plant if the air in the room is too dry and the temperature is too high. At the same time, a thin cobweb can be seen on the leaves and flowers. The appearance of the scale insect is characterized by growths on the leaves, and aphids form colonies that are visible to the naked eye.
To get rid of parasites, the plant is washed with soapy water. If necessary, special insecticidal preparations can be used.
To prevent the appearance of diseases and parasites and to grow a healthy plant, it must be provided with a suitable temperature and humidity of the soil and air. When preparing the soil for an orchid, you yourself need to thoroughly dry and ventilate it in order to destroy the larvae of pests.
Home care
In order for the orchid not to get sick and to please with its flowers, it needs to create conditions that are as close to natural as possible.
For this, it is important to provide the correct lighting, temperature, humidity and some other indicators. Orchid care for beginners is not an easy process, the flower requires special attention
How to choose an orchid pot
For the plant to feel comfortable, the pot must have drainage holes. Excess moisture will leave through them. To make it easier to track the condition of the roots and substrate, experienced flower growers are advised to plant and grow an orchid in transparent plastic pots.
Ceramic pots are not suitable for an orchid - its roots grow very quickly to the walls. If transparent containers seem unaesthetic to you, you can place them in an additional, more spacious pot made of ceramic or glass.
It is equally important to know how to care for an orchid in a pot correctly.
Zamioculcas plant: planting and care at home
Choosing a place in the room
The orchid does not tolerate even minor movements, so it is important to choose a permanent place for it.It should be well lit, but without access to direct sunlight, which causes burns and damages flowering.
South windows are not suitable for keeping orchids. On the north side, the flower will need additional lighting. The best option would be a western or eastern window sill.
Features of proper lighting
Orchid is a tropical plant, in its homeland daylight hours are very long. Growing orchids at home will require organizing a fairly bright, but diffused lighting for 13-15 hours a day. If the plant receives enough light, it will regularly throw out buds. With a lack of sunlight, it begins to turn yellow and fade.
In summer, the flower can be grown in the shade, covering it from direct sunlight with a piece of plastic or a translucent film. This protection can be removed in autumn. In winter, when the daylight hours are short, you can use additional light sources.
Temperature regime
All types of orchids will feel good at daytime temperatures from + 18 to +27 degrees and at night from +13 to +24. However, it should be borne in mind that all types of orchids are usually divided into three groups according to their sensitivity to air temperature:
- Heat-loving varieties that grow naturally in tropical forests and plains. These include dendrobiums and phalaenopsis. During the day, such flowers need a temperature of 15 to 32 degrees, and at night - from 15 to 18 degrees.
- Medium temperature varieties - miltonia and odontoglossum. These plants need a cooler temperature - 18-22 degrees during the day and 12-15 degrees at night.
- Cold-loving - Australian dendrobiums, laelias and papiopedilums. The optimal temperature for breeding them will be 22 degrees during the day and 12-15 at night.
How to properly water an orchid
For an orchid, a slight drying out is less dangerous than an excess of moisture. This should be taken into account when watering. The plant needs active hydration during rapid growth and flowering.
The quality of watering can be assessed by the appearance of the plant. With a lack of moisture, the leaves will wither and the bulbs will shrivel. If there is too much water, the roots of the flower will begin to rot and the leaves will turn yellow.
Irrigation technology is also important. The orchid can be placed in a container with warm water, or it can be poured from the shower.
After that, the pot with the flower is put on the wire rack so that the excess water is glass.
Growing and caring for citrofortunella at home
Top dressing and fertilizers
Plant feeding is needed during the period of active growth. Fertilizers for orchids must be selected only of special types. The feeding procedure should be alternated with watering, carrying them out in a week. It is unacceptable to use preparations for other indoor flowers. In winter, the plant does not need additional feeding.
How to choose?
The Phalaenopsis orchid is considered the most unpretentious in terms of care, which for a novice grower will be an ideal starting plant at the beginning of the study of orchids. Before choosing and buying a flower, you need to ask the seller about the date of bringing the plant to the store. The longer the plant is on the counter, the worse its quality, as in flower shops very often hygiene rules are not followed.
If the orchid is in the store for about 3 weeks, you should inspect the conditions for its maintenance.
- The pots in which the orchid grows should be transparent and preferably perforated. Through them, the roots of the plant are clearly visible, and perforation improves oxygen access to the root system.
- The shelves on which the pots are placed must be clean and dry.
- The tray under the pot should also be dry.
Most often, any orchid has a tag that carries information about the plant and its conditions. Otherwise, this information must be obtained from the seller.If the seller does not know anything about the conditions of detention, you can imagine the state of the plants in this store at the moment.
All orchids are tropical inhabitants, and they are hard at low temperatures, so it is better to plan the purchase of this flower for the warm season, since it will not withstand a sharp temperature drop. Impatient flower growers are advised to stock up on bottles of warm water in winter to warm the newly purchased plant.
During the March flower frenzy, a lot of all kinds of flowers are often sold on the streets, among which you can also find orchids. Experts do not advise buying such specimens, since such plants will live for a relatively short time.
When choosing a plant, the first thing they pay attention to is the roots of the orchid, which can tell a lot to the gardener. By the green long ends of the roots, you can talk about the active phase of flower growth, which means that the care for it at this stage is correct and the orchid is healthy
The sleep phase is indicated by green dots at the end of the root.
It is important that the leaves are healthy and not dead. If there is no green dot, then such roots indicate a lack of moisture, and sometimes an excess of it.
In this case, the root system can be black or gray. Such a flower is difficult to reanimate, so it is better not to purchase it.
Too bright leaves indicate excessive abuse of fertilizers, which will negatively affect both flowering and the immunity of the plant as a whole. It will be vulnerable to the occurrence of various diseases.
Many people try to buy an already blooming orchid for their home, because you can immediately see what the flowers look like on a branch, and in this case you won't have to wait for flowering. But here the buyer makes a mistake. An orchid takes a lot of effort to bloom, and it is quite possible that it has been on store shelves for quite some time. If you still want to buy an orchid with flowers, then you need to take it at the initial flowering stage, when there are still unopened buds on it.
Winter watering regime
The main rule of winter watering is to reduce the frequency of watering and doses. During this period of cooling, even in orchids without an obvious state of dormancy, life rhythms slow down a little, that is, the roots simply will not have time to absorb the usual amount of water. This is not difficult to observe: just check the moisture content of the substrate and watch the color of the roots. Healthy roots are light green or slightly lilac. If the roots turn gray, they urgently need to be watered. How to do it correctly, you can find out in our special section.
The most common mistake made by flower growers is improper care of plants after watering. Without waiting for the moment when the roots absorb enough water, and the excess moisture completely drains into a special vessel under the pot, novice growers return it to its original place (most often it is a window sill) along with that very vessel. It must be borne in mind that the air temperature near the window is slightly lower than in the entire room, and the roots still continue to absorb the already cooled moisture, in the process of which they supercool themselves. This situation is ideal for the development of diseases in orchids (most often these are fungal diseases). To prevent such an outcome, it is not necessary to remove the plants from the window, it is enough to put a sheet of foam plastic between the plants and the windowsill, and place the flowers themselves in special pots with a depression. This will provide thermal insulation and protection for the orchids.
If you like to give your orchids a warm shower as watering, then it is best to do this in the evening and leave them to dry overnight in the bathroom. This trick will help prevent the formation of rot at the growing point. Moreover, the humid and warm bathroom environment is close to natural conditions, so the orchids will be grateful for such a gift.
Features of winter watering
Watering for a plant is life. But in the cold season, watering is necessary much less often. Watering orchids in winter is usually done once every one and a half weeks.
When caring for these tropical beauties, it is important to remember that they do not tolerate hypothermia. The main mistake that beginners face is when, when watering, immersing the pot in a container of water, and then taking it out, they do not allow the water to drain out of the pot properly.
Then it is placed on the windowsill, it cools down there, the remaining water in the pot and the substrate also cools down and the roots gradually absorb the supercooled water. The result is that the plant begins to suffer over time due to the development of bacterial and fungal diseases.
In order to avoid this problem, you need to provide the flower with good thermal insulation. It is not necessary to rearrange the pot from the windowsill; it will be enough to insulate the place where it stands. To do this, you need a small piece of Styrofoam. This material does an excellent job of thermal insulation. You will need to put a pot on the foam; in addition, it would be nice to put it in a planter with a high bottom. The water that remains in the substrate will gradually drain into the pots and the roots will not absorb it.
For an orchid in winter, grooming plays a vital role. Since heating in apartments dries up the air, the room should be humidified to make these flowers feel comfortable. In addition to dry air, which is not beneficial to plants, spider mites multiply in a dry environment. To increase the humidity in the air, you can turn on a humidifier. Another good way to increase humidity in the room is a small decorative fountain, which, on the one hand, decorates the interior of the room, and on the other hand humidifies the air. For such care, orchids will certainly thank you with beautiful and healthy flowers.
Moist and warm air is an ideal environment for flowers. From time to time, those varieties of orchids that do not hibernate can be watered from the shower. But in this case, after a shower, they must be left in the bathroom until the necessary moisture is completely absorbed. The ideal time to shower is evening. After this procedure, the flowers will be in a humid environment, and this is exactly what they need; overnight, the plant will have time to dry out, which will prevent the accumulation of water on the leaves and at the points of growth of the leaves. Spraying flowers in winter is not recommended. But in extreme cases, if, for example, you need to remove pests from the leaves, the spraying should be in the form of hot water dust. This irrigation will not harm the flowers.
When carrying out care for an orchid in winter, do not forget about lighting. In winter, there is often a shortage of sunlight. And for these plants, light is necessary so that they can fully develop and, as a result, be able to lay flower buds. In winter, it is best to place a flowerpot with a flower on the windowsill of a window that faces the south side of the world. Then he will be able to receive significantly more sunlight than being in a darkened room. Alternatively, you can provide the flower with additional lighting with a fluorescent lamp. The lamp should be at least 20 centimeters from the plant. In this case, it is not necessary to put the flowerpot on the windowsill, you can choose any warm place for it, which you then equip with lighting.
The optimum air temperature for a flower in winter is from +15 to +23 degrees. Orchids love not only warmth, but also fresh air, only, of course, not frosty. When ventilating the room, you should avoid drafts, as they can quickly freeze the leaves. Therefore, while airing the room, you need to remove the flowerpot from the windowsill so that cold air currents do not get on it. You also need to make sure that the leaves do not come into contact with cold glasses.
Fertilizing plants in winter is not necessary too often.Since the daylight hours are long in summer and spring and the air temperature is high enough, the flower quickly processes nutrients, and in winter, due to a lack of light and heat, these processes slow down.
Step-by-step instructions for moistening the soil during the budding period
At home
How to water a blooming orchid growing at home:
- establish regular watering with alternating moisture evaporation (in a room with sufficient humidity and sufficient light - every three days);
- it is better to underfill than overmoisten. In summer, water evaporates faster, so you should water more during this period, in spring - more moderately. In winter, special control is needed, since the orchid often blooms at this time, gardeners make the mistake of moisturizing the plant in the same way as in summer. This is wrong, in winter watering should be minimized;
- excess water is drained from the pan (the orchid is extremely sensitive to excess moisture);
- water with soft, settled water;
- pour warm water (about +37 degrees Celsius).
We wrote here about how to water an orchid at home so that it blooms well, and here it is described how to do this if a flower grows in a pot or flowerpot.
Outside
For orchids outdoors:
- use soft (rain or heated melt) water;
- let the soil dry out almost completely;
- water more often than if the orchids were in the room;
- spray with a mixture of water and horticultural oil (or dishwashing detergent) every three weeks to keep out insects.
Caring for an orchid requires some knowledge. In the hands of an inexperienced grower, this flower will not fully reveal its potential, diseases and cessation of flowering will begin. Most flowers of this species are not naturally found in water, due to the fact that their roots do not tolerate stagnant moisture and can rot from salts in its composition.
The orchid is considered a capricious plant, but if certain rules are followed, this tropical beauty will feel great, regularly blooming bunches of gorgeous flowers.
If you want to grow a healthy and beautiful orchid that will delight the eye, then we advise you to read our articles on how to water a flower, including when transplanting into another pot.
Tips for beginners on how to properly care for a flower at home
Proper care of the plant involves features depending on the season, type of flower, flowering.
In winter
In the winter season, orchids fall into a dormant state. In December and January, the plant does not need fertilization. Watering becomes rare, once a week. A supply of fresh air is needed to aerate the roots. Do you need daily spraying or you need to put the pot in wet pebbles.
From the beginning of February, the length of daylight hours increases. At this time, orchids begin to wake up and lay flower stalks. From this moment, watering is more frequent and fertilizers are applied. If the location of the flower is on the sunny side and the temperature rises, the number of sprays of the flower increases. Regular ventilation is needed.
We recommend watching a video about caring for orchids in the winter:
In the spring
Spring preparation for the summer period. In March, intensive growth begins, so you need to water and feed regularly
It is important to ensure that the plant is not exposed to sunburn after the winter shade. On the sunny side, in the daytime, the plant is best shaded.
In addition to growth, pests are activated. Regular inspection of the plant for the presence of parasites, and processing are necessary procedures in the spring. The beginning of April is the flowering period - therefore, spraying, watering and feeding are needed regularly. And in May, after the establishment of warm weather, the pot with the plant should be taken out into the street.
Summer
In summer, orchids feel better, because the climate is close to their natural one. The homeland of orchids is the tropics and in addition to temperature, humidity and shading are needed.Starting in June, the plants need to be sprayed often, the room should be ventilated, preventing the development of bacteria and decay of the roots. If in May it was not yet possible to put the pots out on the street, then in June it is high time for this.
Starting in July, when the sun is active, it is important to prevent sunburn. Therefore, watering and spraying are carried out early in the morning and in the evening, after sunset.
In the daytime, it is imperative to create a shadow. It is important to monitor the roots, preventing the development of fungal growths.
Attention: At the end of summer, from the beginning of August, the sun is no longer so active, but watering, spraying and fertilizing are maintained in the same mode as in July. If the plants are outside, it's time to bring them into the house .. We recommend watching a video about caring for orchids in the summer:
We recommend watching a video about caring for orchids in the summer:
In autumn
In the fall, some orchid species still bloom and shoot arrows. But the mode of watering, spraying and feeding should be reduced, preparing the plants for the winter dormant period. You can no longer shade the orchids. The sun is not so active and there will be no burns. Starting from October and November, some plants lose their leaves and turn yellow.
It is necessary to reduce watering and lower the temperature of the content. From the moment the heating is supplied, humidification of the air in the room and spraying are necessary. If the orchid is in bloom, then backlighting is necessary, since the daylight hours are already short.
By observing the basics of plant care at certain times of the year, you can get long and frequent flowering. The plant will feel good and will not require additional costs. But, there are features not only at different times of the year. Learn more about how to help your orchid survive the cold season here.
Peculiarities
These flowers are thermophilic. In winter, they need special care, which is slightly different from caring for a plant in summer and spring. Indoor flowers have their own characteristics, so before purchasing them, you should familiarize yourself with how to properly maintain them. Otherwise, orchids may stop blooming, and sometimes even die.
Plants that grow in the wild adapt to climate conditions and are able to withstand temperature extremes. They grow and develop well, even if the temperature drops or rises sharply. Domestic plants cannot maintain their health in the cold, they are not adapted to it. That is why special conditions should be created in winter.
It should be remembered that the plant should not be placed on the windowsill after watering.
It is also important to monitor soil conditions and moisture levels. Excess liquid will drain into the trays under the pot.
As a result, water will accumulate there.
Most often in winter, the window sill is cold, which means that the temperature of the liquid will be reduced. If the flower absorbs cold water, its roots will freeze, which can lead to a variety of diseases and bacteria. To get rid of this problem, you should install the orchid pots on foam plastic - it will not cool down, and the water will remain at room temperature.
