Yes, my small white Phalaenopsis is going through a process of transformation. Not to the good direction though. But that's life, I guess, we always adapt, transform and change ourselves, so do the plants too. When I saw the beautiful flowers in Ewkaw's post, I was tempted to check my plant. Not that I don't take care of my plants or neglect them, but they are outside on the balcony so not that often I observe all the details on them. That is how happened that I didn't see earlier a sad transformation my poor orchid is going through.
First of all, I was warned, winter is not good for an orchid to be outside. I know. But as this is a well-protected place from the cold, I just let it live with the succulents on the terrace. I even water it at the same pace as the succulents, about once a week. Until now, everything went fine.
Just until now! My first "cold shower" was seeing one big leaf having some brown and yellow spots, well, already bigger stains. Then I saw that some stems and buds are also drying out too.
I think it is normal for the branches to dry out after flowering. ( not after each blooming as many times from those just naked stems new buds are appearing after some time). However, I have noticed it is not the same way how those stems look now. They are now black and have some yellow stripes, stains on them.
It would still all look normal and acceptable. The stems would maybe dry and I could cut them, and new ones will come. However, unlike I thought, not just that one leaf is affected by the transformation. I found on the underside of one other leaf a brown spot too.
And here we go, one another leaf, that decided that green is just too boring. I took these photos yesterday... Today, the brown stain has spread and it looks worse. Goodbye to this leaf too! Three out of four big leaves are doing the same thing. Why, why, why?
I should maybe cut them, but the most probable scenery is that they will fall by themselves, I think. Some new leaves are growing below that big one. They still look good, but guess what? In the peaks of them, there are also some pale yellow-brown spots.
From now on the plant will be inside, both because of the cold (there were some colder days indeed) and sun (though the sun didn't reach too much there). Thanks to Ewkaw's advice and guess what can be with my orchid, I also checked the roots. They look ok, there are no rotten parts or waterlogging in the pot. I just watered the plant before I took the photo so the soil is wet because of that.
The plant still has plenty of new buds, but I am afraid they will die, as some parts of those stems are dried and some not. And the plant will lose the leaves, that is for sure. The big branch with a lot of flowers blooming right now looks good.
This is how the whole plant is. The dried branches are reminiscent of scenes from a horror movie, but this branch with white flowers still gives hope. Orchid lovers, please don't cry over this half-sad scene. But if you have any idea what to do, shoot. Or we should just pray now for its survival of the transformation and environment change as I took it inside, to a warm place :D
