And the 'Best' fertilizer for orchids is...

[Brabantia]

Not later that yesterday I saw at the aunt's of my wife splendid Cymbidiums (foliage without any stain and in very good health). They are cultivated in some humus of leaf sieved (under beeches). I asked him how she prepared this substrate here is its method: move aside the upper coat of leaves, collect the coat of material which is under this one and sieve it on the 8 mm sieve. She never gives any fertilyser. Knowing the voracity of Cymbidiums this organic matter must certainly be very rich in nitrogen (mineral and organic forms) and other necessary elements. ... to be tried!
Remark: she added no dolomie, no bark, no sponge rock, no perlite ... nothing, nothing else pure leaves humus!

 

[NYEric]

..I already have.

Send me a sample; but if it turns out to be Dali Lama poop you're going to get it!!

 

[gonewild]

Send me a sample; but if it turns out to be Dali Lama poop you're going to get it!!

Dali Lama lives is Asia, down here we have the Incas. No poop.

Poop is junk food for orchids, we need to feed them a natural diet based on good nutrition. Stop obesity!

 

[Trithor]

Not later that yesterday I saw at the aunt's of my wife splendid Cymbidiums (foliage without any stain and in very good health). They are cultivated in some humus of leaf sieved (under beeches). I asked him how she prepared this substrate here is its method: move aside the upper coat of leaves, collect the coat of material which is under this one and sieve it on the 8 mm sieve. She never gives any fertilyser. Knowing the voracity of Cymbidiums this organic matter must certainly be very rich in nitrogen (mineral and organic forms) and other necessary elements. ... to be tried!
Remark: she added no dolomie, no bark, no sponge rock, no perlite ... nothing, nothing else pure leaves humus!

In Frederick Boyles' book, 'The Culture of Greenhouse Orchids - Old System and New' 1902, he describes a potting medium used in Belgium and Netherlands as being exactly this, and goes on to say that the plants do exceptionally well in it. If I recall correctly, he also indicated that results were very different from one leaf type to another. I will need to look through my books to find the passage

 

[Trithor]

PS. what happened to 'Limu'?

 

[gonewild]

PS. what happened to 'Limu'?

He took a hike.
Probably gathering all the moss along the trail.

 

[Stone]

Not later that yesterday I saw at the aunt's of my wife splendid Cymbidiums (foliage without any stain and in very good health). They are cultivated in some humus of leaf sieved (under beeches). I asked him how she prepared this substrate here is its method: move aside the upper coat of leaves, collect the coat of material which is under this one and sieve it on the 8 mm sieve. She never gives any fertilyser. Knowing the voracity of Cymbidiums this organic matter must certainly be very rich in nitrogen (mineral and organic forms) and other necessary elements. ... to be tried!
Remark: she added no dolomie, no bark, no sponge rock, no perlite ... nothing, nothing else pure leaves humus!

Does she use what is left in the sieve or what falls through?
I think good leaf mold is very good. For cyms which can fill a big pot with roots very quickly and ''eat'' all the humus there is probably no problem, but for paphs which grow very slowly, if you use 100% leaves, it can turn to mud before the roots fill the pot. I thought about trying leaf mold mixed with big peices of polysytrene to keep it open for longer. But now I'm using chopped oak leaves and moss at about 10-15% with bark, charcoal and some sand and the paphs seem to love that and you don't have to worry about feeding so much. Always experimenting!

 

[Rick]

I set up a compot of Paph calosum var sublaeve seedlings in a mix of mostly shredded fall leaves (~80% by volume) with some sand a little sponge rock, and charcoal. They have been in it for about 2 years and get no fertilizer (other than what drips or overspray from everything over and near them).

The mix volume did decline after a year, so last fall/winter I shredded a fresh batch of leaves to add on top of the old stuff. Shredding is by the food processor.

I also set up a few individual plants in 2" pots with a CHC mix, and set up another compot in a bark mix that was given feeding (first weekly at 50-100ppm N, but now almost daily at 1-5ppm N.

The compot of leaf mix with no food is ahead of the bark compot. But the bark mix is starting to catch up since they've been getting the dilute ration. The individual pots are a mix of way better than the leaf litter compot, and about average for either of the compots.

The same time I set up the calosums, I set up a 4" pot with a common Liparis species (viridiflorum I think). Also no fert. It grows like crazy but hasn't bloomed even though it puts of lots of sheaths. I started giving it the Mg phosphate mix, and it got a lot greener, and bigger, but still no blooms yet.

My leaf litter is a mix of mostly two species of oak, some black locust, and some poplar.

 

[TyroneGenade]

I was mixing leaf litter into stone and that seem to work OK. I would mix equal volumes of leaf and stone. The leaf litter compacted a lot. It does break down to mud very quickly and think this would need to be repeated yearly. Growth was very good and water retention was also very high---I was quite surprised.

 

[Stone]

Shredding is by the food processor.

I bet your wife is real happy about that!
I've planted english oak, pin oak, turkey oak and algerian oak so I use a combination of that but I've also found that dry treefern fronds last even longer---which reminds me I must get down to the local rainforest to get some more! They say that dry bracken is also good. Some of the old timers used to harvest it like hay, dry it and use it for Cym mixes. Do they have bracken ferns in the US?

 

[paphioboy]

Poop is junk food for orchids, we need to feed them a natural diet based on good nutrition. Stop obesity!

Obesity is good (for plants)..:evil: Goat and chicken poop is the way to go (for me).. but not regular.. 3-4 times a year

 

[SlipperKing]

Lance,
My question is why are there lichens growing on or near every wild orchid I look at and never on orchids growing in pots?
You probably already touched on this. We have "dead" bark in our pots not live trees.

 

[Brabantia]

@Stone

Does she use what is left in the sieve or what falls through?

She use what is falls through.

 

[gonewild]

Lance,
My question is why are there lichens growing on or near every wild orchid I look at and never on orchids growing in pots?
You probably already touched on this. We have "dead" bark in our pots not live trees.

Lichens do grow on dead surfaces. If we could make the environment correct lichens would grow and then we would have the perfect environment for orchids.
I think the main reason lichens don't grow in our environments is because lichens are extremely sensitive to air pollution.

 

[Trithor]

Lichens do grow on dead surfaces. If we could make the environment correct lichens would grow and then we would have the perfect environment for orchids.
I think the main reason lichens don't grow in our environments is because lichens are extremely sensitive to air pollution.

And I would imagine even more sensitive to water pollution

 

[gonewild]

And I would imagine even more sensitive to water pollution

If that is true (probably) then when we fertilize we probably prevent Lichens from growing.

 

[NYEric]

I think that on the evolutionary scale we have been looking at lichens incorrectly. In order it should be algaes, mosses, than lichens. If I could grow all my plants in mixture heavier in live moss i might be able to get lichens to grow. Unfortunately in an indoor environment the efficient break down of media leads to all types of fungal and insect, and snail issues.

 

[Trithor]

I too wish I could get lichen to grow, as the more I research them, the more I believe that they are a missing link in my growing. I am not too sure how they will help my paphs, but them aside, the rest of my collection could do with a bit of help at the moment! I am sure that council water, fertilizer and all the chemicals we throw at our plants have a long term effect on preventing any lichen growth.

 

[Brabantia]

This discussion about lichens remember me my thread of 05/06 this year (Here). On the first picture on the right side is this lichens?

 

[TyroneGenade]

No, I think its a liverwort.