Large Phals lots of spikes!

Slippertalk Orchid Forum

Help Support Slippertalk Orchid Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
I think Donald Trump commanded them to grow, so they did -- because he said so :rollhappy:
 
nice, did you subject them to low temperature during the night? I have a Phal that just grows and grows without ever flowering.
 
That is impressive! What kind of fertilizer are you feeding them with? Did you do anything differently this time?

I make my own fertilizer from bulk chemicals. The formula changes frequently.
I do things differently every time! But yes what you are seeing in the pictures is the results of some very different specific manipulations.
 
I am impatient to know how one could arrive at such a result and especially to see flowerings which will result from your experiment.

The result is from long term study of plant growth and trying different ideas and concepts in search for better results. I too am anxious to see how the plants handle the volume of potential flowers.
 
My guess is keeping temps above 82 F to keeping them vegetative (ie suppressing spike initiation), having them grow to monstrous proportions before chilling them (below 77 F in day and below 70 at night) and raising light levels at the same time.
But what's the special sauce?

Congrats, these are stunning specimen plants!

You have the basic concept of temperatures and spike induction. Our grow temperatures are very warm.
Day temperatures often are above 36c (97F) in our open air grow area.
We have a evap cooled house that stays at and below 32c (90F).
Nights cool off to 24-27c (75-80F).

To induce spikes we move into an air conditioned space at specific temps well below 77F. For this experiment I used specific night/day temperature changes between 19c and 75c (66-75F).

The secret sauce is only part secret at this point.
Growth is one part. Blooming is a separate part.
The main thing is to provide the correct nutrients in the correct amounts at the correct time to grow the plant strong enough. I've made no secret about how I think plants need to be fertilized. :wink:
 
I think they do this for the giant phals in taiwan. I think another thing they do is up the CO2.

The giant white phals in Taiwan genetically produce a lot of flowers. I'm trying to import this variety to see what happens here. The genetics of my plants max out at about 15 flowers on a spike and the V3 from taiwan has twice that many.

I have not increased CO2 yet. I think that will give even a better growth result.
It's on my to do list.
 
nice, did you subject them to low temperature during the night? I have a Phal that just grows and grows without ever flowering.

Yes most Phal varieties need a cool period to produce spikes.
The assumed magic number is above 28c the plant remains vegetative and will not bloom. So if you can drop the day temperature below 28c and then get the night below 24c you will probably induce spikes to form. It takes about a month at these temperatures. When I drop the night temp to19c I see spikes in about 18 days. The big plants in the pictures will remain in the cold for 2 months.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top