This orchid can't survive? The reason will shock you

Everyone who has kept orchids has run into this: at a flower market or flower shop, the plants look fine, the potting soil is bone dry or even caked, yet the leaves are unusually dark green and glossy. But once you bring them home, they are very hard to keep alive. What is the reason?

An orchid-growing friend shared a real example with me that may give the questioner some insight. He went to a flower market and bought a pot of orchids. At the time he saw the orchid soil was also very dry, and he was puzzled and asked the owner: why do orchids in such dry soil have such glossy leaves? The owner told him this soil was good.

So he bought the potted orchid, carrying it home pot, soil and all. After a month he found the orchid had stopped growing, and when he tipped out the pot to look, the orchid roots had almost completely rotted away. He was also very confused: why could it grow perfectly well at the flower market, but not once he took it home?

Orchids like this, while at the flower market owner's place, generally are not watered, because of labor costs and technical requirements and other reasons, and some vendors even want you to fail to keep them alive (of course this is very rare).

They habitually spray water and foliar fertilizer to ensure the nutrient supply for the orchid leaves, thus making the orchids look better for sale. Because the roots of such orchids have long lacked exercise, their physiological functions gradually degenerate, and they have long existed in name only. After ordinary orchid growers buy them and take them home, their planting and care cannot reach that standard, so how can the orchids survive?

In fact, normal orchid growth requires free flow from top to bottom, with leaves and orchid roots working together. Orchid roots draw nutrients and water from the soil; leaves draw water from the air and energy from sunlight. This way the orchid roots will grow in sync with the orchid plants. If you tip out the pot and look at the roots, you will understand: roots and leaves are in direct proportion. If you find the orchid leaves unusually lush while the orchid roots are disproportionately shrunken, then you need to be careful.