This is a seedling Roth, growing under lights, in the same mix as my others, mostly bark with some perlite and limestone chips. The seedling is slow growing, compared to my other Roths, but has put out a new root which has reached the bottom of the pot and I can see a new leaf emerging. The leaves just look too yellow for my liking. Thoughts?
Are these leaves too yellow?
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Well they look okay to me. Perhaps a bit more nitrogen in your feeding regimen will turn them greener? These are babies, months away from being large enough to flower. As such, they do not require as much light.
How far below the tubes are they.
For how many hours are the lights on?
How far below the tubes are they.
For how many hours are the lights on?
We need to know your water, fertilizer, fertilizer concentration, fertilizer frequency. If you happen to know the EC and pH of your fertilizer concentration some of us will be very pleased. If you don't, we may be able to infer it based on your water and fertilizer.
Roth
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Use an urea-based fertilizer on it, and it will green up instant.
It is indeed not the normal leaf color, and the plant suffers a lot, the newer leaves are getting smaller and smaller, plus there is an intense chlorosis.
It would be helpful to know what kind of fertilizer you use and the pH/potting mix. As well, rothschildianum plants of all sizes hate nitrate nitrogen as a main nitrogen source, and usually responds by extremely chlorotic, yellowish leaves like that. K-Lite, MSU or RainMix would certainly induce this kind of leaf bleaching...
It is indeed not the normal leaf color, and the plant suffers a lot, the newer leaves are getting smaller and smaller, plus there is an intense chlorosis.
It would be helpful to know what kind of fertilizer you use and the pH/potting mix. As well, rothschildianum plants of all sizes hate nitrate nitrogen as a main nitrogen source, and usually responds by extremely chlorotic, yellowish leaves like that. K-Lite, MSU or RainMix would certainly induce this kind of leaf bleaching...
I use rainwater for all of my plants, collected as run off from my greenhouse, I use seaweed extract at slightly above the recommended concentration, I use half strength rain mix fertiliser, (every 6 months or so I also include Epsom salts) designed for rainwater so has all trace elements. I expect the mix is very slightly acid but essentially neutral, I use this at every watering, with every third watering just using pure rainwater, to flush out ant solids, I repot in fresh mix every year. The plant is around 45 cm from the above light.
Thats interesting to know, from most things I have read urea nitrogen was to be avoided, I never thought that different species would require different nitrogen sources. I thought the issue was down to trace element deficiency such as calcium, that's why I started adding limestone chips, about 2 years ago, and use lots of seaweed extract. My other roths, Sanderianum, and MK seem OK. Although maybe the Roth on the right of this image could be a little greener?
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good cross, I think.
Roth
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Excellent cross.... I have bloomed the earlier generation from Paph Paradise, and there were no runts. Unlike an infamous US source now defunct, the seedlings all bloomed similar to one or the other parent, with many intergrades between them....
Urea is essential for most orchids to grow them well and fast... The story of the nitrate absorbed by the roots is quack science as well. We did tests with tagged nitrate, ammonium, urea and a couple of amino acids. There are orchids that, in fact, are unable to assimilate nitrate in any flavor...
Roth, do you think urea fertilizer only works with organic media with a strong microorganism population? Do you think it can work with LECA as the medium, an almost hydroponic situation with intermittent fertigation from above?
interesting. I know roth leaves should be chartreuse in order to bloom.
I’m so curious what the “infamous US source” was?
It's hard to get paph paradise plants in the UK, this one was grown from a flask by a UK nursery. I have just order some urea based fertiliser 46% so I will see how I get on with that.
It works in inorganic media, he helped me to tune my feeding in rockwool.
Roth
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Yes, as Tony said, it works great in inorganic media... In fact the Eric Young back then when they had all the awarded plants in floculated rockwool in the 90s were using a tomato feed with ammonium for hydroponics, and were adding a lot of urea. And no worries about 'forcing' plants or whatever, they just grow perfectly well like that.
Roth
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Orchid Inn/Sam Tsui of course... You know, the problem is that I am in the professional world, and I supplied most of the Paphiopedilum growers directly or not. I bought from many as well, so I know what happens and how. I know as well when I see a plant that I was offered by a Taiwanese nursery, when it reappears a couple months or weeks later with a prestigious tag, well...
As for me, let's say there was a story of emersonii fma. luteum in the 90s, a couple of plants picked up at pot plant traders, moquetteanum album, primulinum album 4n, pot plant Complex paphs that suddenly from bastards NoID they were started to have a pedigree, parentage, awards, and more, that deterred me from pursuing further the commercial relationship.
I have seen, and tested quite a lot of things. In fact, to sum it up, with a few actors in the world that were pristine clean, a lot are more out for the money, no matter how friendly or 'supporting' they can be...
Aww that makes me sad. I had a nice relationship with Sam. I am a small, windowsill, noncompetitive grower so I’m sure it’s different. But his facility was a wonderland. Thank you for explaining.
Please forgive me for my confusion, but what exactly is the problem with Orchid Inn/Sam Tsui’s plants? I have several Roth crosses that I ordered from Orchid Inn shortly before they closed up shop. Is there some reason that I should be concerned about them?
Lots of mislabeled plants, plus the plants were loaded with mealies and many had poor or no roots toward the end. All of my roths have bloomed true but hybrids have been a crapshoot.
Roth
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Mmmmh the problem is that they bloomed true to rothschildianum species...
Actually I am one of a few that can speak with experience. I have bred rothschildianum for a very long time, ordered flasks from several sources to complete as well my breeding park.
The general rule:
- Any roth cross I did myself with parent A and parent B would produce all the progeny showing traits of A and B, some much better of course.
- The roth from Paph Paradise, 2 crosses bloomed so far ( Dark Angel x Howard Martin, and Paradise Island x Paradise Lost), all bloomed similar to the parents, you could see even in the worst of the seedlings that they were from those parents.
- Shen-Liu from Taiwan was the same story, all the seedlings bloomed intermediate between the parents, no exception. In-Charm as well.
- Others, nope... you could never get 1 remotely close to the parent out of hundreds. Which does not mean that the cross did not exist... but that most likely the 'real' ones were kept to bloom/show/award/sell at top price in flowers, and the remaining was garbage from generic parents.
- That applies to many other species, and hybrids to some extent. If you don't recognize at all the parents, it is because they were not the parents.
- Many sources, the roth blooming are of a different pedigree/type than the parents... It is due to the fact that cheap roth, generic seedlings ( and some can be really good, sometimes) are available in Taiwan for an exceedingly cheap price. I know those sources, I have seen and bloomed those kind of batches before myself, and let's say that I can recognize when a roth blooms and is from those type of pedigree ( pointy dorsal, pale flowers, etc...). The fun being that when I was buying 3 different 'linebred roths' from 3 different sources sometimes, I would get 3 plants obviously of the same age, grower, and parentage.
I will give a little bit of history too... When I visited the Orchid Zone in the 90s there were some rothschildianum Rex x Mt Millais, and benches of Rex x Mt Kinabalu, literally benches. Once the first Rex x MM started to bloom, the Rex x Mt Kinabalu ( more yellowish flowers, narrower dorsal, etc...) completely disappeared from the surface of the world, including at the Orchid Zone... This explains too that some if not many Rex x Mt Millais bloomed with very 'weird' flowers. The Taiwanese paid top price to have Rex x Mt Millais back then, and things like TN-Tiger, TN-Lion are really Rex x Mt Millais. Others were as well really Rex x Mt Millais in the US of course, but there were clearly 2 different pedigrees sold as Rex x Mt Millais. Plus 2000-3000 seedlings of 15+cm leafspan of Rex x Mt Kinabalu do not 'disappear' like that overnight. There were absolutely, and radically, nowhere to be seen or offered, because their tags were swapped.
Another point in case, all the crosses of 'Colossus' were truly and absolutely awful, no one has ever bloomed a good one out of it ( I think I saw 1 ?). It had gigantic leaves. But the notoriety of the Orchid Zone back then was such that it was impolite to ask for a picture of the parents. The Wizard in action... None of the big buyers at the Orchid Zone ever saw as well a photo of that famous Colossus... But it was accepted, and sold as sure an extraordinary grex with top quality pedigree... The story of 'Chester Hill' from the Orchid Zone too was strange, it was Chester Hill, but not a division, or a selfing that Terry bought at great price of Janet x Chester Hill and named Janet, or a Charles E. that Terry though was the real Chester Hill, that's why he renamed it The story changed all the time about what it was exactly. It did produce a lot of bad roths, that's however for certain...
One of the issues people have trouble to deal with is that, being nice, kind, and sweet does not mean anything about honesty, and the relationship to a seller is ultimately for the buyer to buy, and for the seller to make a profit. Some do it diplomatically and socially better than others, but it does not mean they are pristine clean.
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Very interesting, it shows the adage alive and well- let the buyer beware- we should consider our suppliers in that light. Also that renaming plants in some commercial establishments in order to sell batches of inferior plants, for higher prices for a more sort after illustrious pedigree plants or crosses.
This is all concerning to hear, I have a couple of Roth seedlings I paid a lot of money for, King Kong x Sandy and Knight Sunshine x Tarantula. Is the likelihood then, that what I have paid for and what I have received are unlikely to be the same? The attached Roth has New Horizon x Raptor on the label, I have to admit I expected it to be larger with better colour, I put this down to it being a first bloom seedling, but now I am having my doubts. Thoughts?
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My flowers from New Horizon x Raptor were garbage, yours and one other I saw here I think last year are the only decent flowers I've seen shared. I don't have the depth of experience with parent cultivars that Xavier has but what I've seen of New Horizon x Raptor has not struck me as the progeny of two top quality roths. If any great ones bloomed they have been kept quiet.
