A rescued Phalaenopsis orchid sends up flower buds in less than half a year, and its blooms are so ethereally beautiful that everyone envies it
At home I currently have more than fifty Phalaenopsis orchids, all of them ones that had finished blooming in various departments or leaders' offices at work and were about to be thrown away. I shamelessly carried them all home in several trips.
It started because I saw a post on a forum about growing Phalaenopsis orchids semi-hydroponically, and after that I was hooked, and I still haven't recovered. But since I couldn't find that many containers suitable for semi-hydroponics, and I'm a rather lazy person, I only grew three in water, repotted four into new medium, and the rest are still in their original sphagnum moss, continuing to grow.
My way of growing orchids:
1. For watering, I stick to the principle of watering only after the sphagnum moss has become light and dry. On normal days, I use liquid fertilizer specially for Phalaenopsis orchids, diluted to one-half or one-third of the stated dosage, and spray two to three times a day (I don't calculate strictly; the instructions say to use 500 times water, so I dilute at 1000 times or 1500 times), and occasionally I spray with plain water.
2. Environment: they stay on the south-facing balcony the whole time, with no shading measures. In summer the light is just right; now the midday sun is a little strong, so some orchids' leaves look slightly sunburned, but overall it doesn't matter.
From the experience of these past six months or so, the Phalaenopsis orchids in sphagnum moss have grown better than those in granular medium and semi-hydroponics.
I won't say more; here are a few photos of Phalaenopsis orchids that already have flower buds, for all you experts and specialists to critique, but please go easy on me. (My photography skills are terrible, please forgive me, all you revolutionary masses.)
This one was grown in granular medium.
These two are semi-hydroponic...
This one has grown super strong, it's just still pretending to be a vegetable...
This one is also very strong....