A Cymbidium goeringii left in a corner for 62 days quietly sprouted, and it taught me a lesson

Do you grow orchids? Do the orchids you grow often end up dying on you? Have you ever wondered why? How strong is an orchid's will to live? If you haven't figured these things out yet, you really aren't cut out for growing orchids. How do the leaves of the orchid below look? Still fairly fresh and green, right? But you'd never guess how it was grown.

March 12, 2018 was Arbor Day, so I remember the date very clearly. A neighbor of mine brought back a few orchids when he went to dig bamboo shoots in a bamboo grove, and since he knew I like growing orchids, he gave them to me. Actually, I don't like this kind of bamboo-grove orchid, because their roots are tightly bound by bamboo rhizomes and they don't root easily after potting, so I casually tossed these few Cymbidium goeringii into a corner.

Today, May 12, 2018, I happened to go to that corner and found that most of these orchids had already dried up, but two still had fresh green leaves. Curious, I took them out to look, and one of them had actually sprouted. Looking at its roots, they had dried up too, except that inside the bamboo rhizome there were still two thin roots that were fleshy and hadn't dried out.

Left outdoors at random for 62 days, it not only didn't die but even sprouted new buds. Don't fellow orchid growers find that incredible? Its location was under an osmanthus tree, with the courtyard wall to the west, so it could only get about one hour of sunlight a day, and that spot had fairly high humidity. I think it was these factors coming together that made survival possible for it.

After reading this article, do you have a deeper appreciation for the four-character mantra that Haoshe Nongfu keeps emphasizing for growing orchids -- rather dry than wet? While you're still agonizing over what potting medium to use, how to water, and how to fertilize, the unmanaged Cymbidium goeringii is living just fine on its own.