flowered plant

[Dung Lung]

In a large clump, there are a number of plants which have flowered. I know that they become nutrition sink for new growths.
My question is, do you remove them to give more space for new shoots, or just wait for their natural aging(to make full use of their nutrition)?

 

[Ozpaph]

please post a photo so we can help you.

 

[Dung Lung]

Ozpaph
It is a general question.
Unfortunately, i do not have a picture!
The largest clump i have is just about 10 growths. But you can easily have useful pictures from within the forum.
I am just curious as to whether it would be beneficial to remove those having flowered to make room for new growths!

 

[Ray]

I view anything that is still green a "contributing member of [that compact] society." They are still photosynthesizing, and absorbing nutrients and water from the environment, all of which can be shared with the colony. Remove them when they no longer do.

 

[Ozpaph]

If its green and healthy leave it.

 

[PaphMadMan]

The choice is very simple. The more old growths a plant has the faster it will grow new ones, they will be bigger, and they will flower more. If you want to remove them to make room go right ahead, but you will be stunting the new growth and limiting future flowers. The more leaves a plant has, even those old ones, the more energy it produces from photosynthesis and the faster it grows.

 

[Dung Lung]

Thank you for your advices. I ll leave them.

I sometimes wonder how the new growths manage to struggle up amongst others, like small trees in a forest!

 

[Cosmic Orchid]

It is probabaly because they are connected as one plant, and the older leaves act like solar panels to collect more energy to be shared among the growths that have smaller "panels". It is not like saplings competing for sun at the forest floor, those are actually competing with each other. Think of the paph growths as "branches" of a smaller tree as it is growing into a new tree. The babies are not really babies, they are little clones still attached that should multiply exponentially as the circles of clumps increases...

 

[Dung Lung]

It makes sense