There's an art to fertilizing orchids: a miscellany on orchid growing, the fertilizing chapter

Growing orchidsis a wonderful thing, and for those of us who love orchids,orchidsare indeed different from other ornamental plants. The way of orchid growing is in fact also a way of cultivating one's character and nature, and I think most friends who have grown orchids for a long time have felt this deeply. When chatting, I often run into friends asking how to groworchidsrobustly. This question is neither too big nor too small; in fact, every orchid enthusiast has their own unique method in practice. Growing orchids is like Cook Ding carving up an ox: only when you understand the underlying principles will you do it methodically and with ease. To put it plainly, once you have grasped the physiological characteristics of Chinese orchids, you can prescribe the right remedy and groworchidswell. Theorchid'srejuvenation can simply be classified into the rejuvenation of mature plants and the rejuvenation of raw, weak plants. Mature plants are generally easier to grow; even if there are only 2-3 shoots, as long as they are healthy, planted and managed by conventional methods, and not divided for 3-5 years, they will generally grow very well. But many beginners atgrowing orchidsbuy some greenhouse plants grown in hard potting media, and often the new growth in the first and second years is very weak; after three years of growing, the purchased plants gradually die off, the new growth is very slow to rejuvenate, and flowering again at home takes a long time, thus wasting both time and energy. Why does this happen? Because the vast majority of orchid enthusiasts do not have the whole set of hardware equipment and management methods of an orchid factory. After those plants are bought home, because they have changed environment or potting medium, it is just like a baby getting an upset stomach from changing food, and they easily die off, or the new growth does not grow robustly enough. Of course, this is not to reject greenhouse plants, but only to remind beginnerorchid growersthat only after you have a whole set of hardware and the necessary management experience can the greenhouse plants you buy grow better year after year. As for the rejuvenation of raw plants and weak plants, it is much more complicated; if an orchid grower has mastered the whole process, they can be called a qualified orchid grower. To trace it to its root, growing the orchid'sFloralroots well is the prerequisite for rejuvenation; when the roots are good, theorchid plant'sappetite is good. Since raw plants have just come down from the mountains, their root systems are often severely damaged and their root absorption capacity is very poor. Before potting, it is best to soak them appropriately in a medicinal solution that promotes root growth. After potting, do not rush to fertilize, not even with fermented organic fertilizer, because the roots cannot absorb these nutrients and this easily causes root rot; haste makes waste instead. If necessary, some foliar fertilizer can be sprayed, because at this time the leaves absorb faster than the roots. So when is a good time to start fertilizing raw plants? According to my personal experience, it is generally when the new growth has grown to 6-7 gongfen high, because at this time theorchid plant'snew roots have already put out an appropriate length, and the damaged old roots have mostly healed and can absorb nutrients. Apply a light fertilizer about every 10 days, and generally the new growth of that year can grow quite robustly. As for some rather precious new wild-collected varieties, the owners are often unwilling to part with them; being able to obtain one or two small plants sprouted from a pseudobulb is already quite lucky. How can those weak plants be quickly rejuvenated? I think every friend has a set of secret methods. Besides using some well-known methods, in practice I find that making use of temperature differences is also a very effective method. Everyone knows that it is very hard to make that year's small growth become robust; 2 leaves are 2 leaves, 3 leaves are 3 leaves, and one can only pin hopes on next year's new growth. Although in winter orchids basically stop external vegetative growth, they do not completely stop all physiological activity; their internal accumulation of nutrients still continues, and it can be said that the whole winter is the season whenthe orchid plantaccumulates nutrients. Although a constant-temperature orchid room produces many shoots, growing madly all winter and producing one more season of shoots than others, it has one fatal drawback: the orchid's pseudobulbs are often not plump enough, and if such orchid plants are bought and grown by ordinary friends, the consequences described at the beginning of this article often result. Therefore, in practice I do not pursue many shoots, but pursue strong shoots. In winter I also add warmth, but it is not constant temperature: during the day it is generally 22 degrees, and at night it is kept at 10 degrees. In this way the orchid plant can both complete nutrient accumulation and carry out slow external vegetative growth. In my place, by the beginning of the second lunar month, the new shoots can basically emerge about 2 gongfen, and they are basically strong shoots. The above are some of my practical experiences; it has been 2 years now, and it is indeed very effective. I hope it can be of some help to friends, and if friends have more advanced methods, I hope they will also bring them out for us to share. Thank you! (Zheng Haiping)