Suspicious spots on Paphs

Slippertalk Orchid Forum

Help Support Slippertalk Orchid Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

The Mutant

Well-Known Member
Joined
Mar 20, 2012
Messages
1,968
Reaction score
49
Location
Sweden
I'm trying to help a fellow member of the Swedish orchid forum identify what could be going on with two of her Paphs.

Here are the afflicted leaves in question:
285205.orig.jpg


Whatever it is it seems to be very slow spreading as she noticed it on her Gloria Naugle before summer and now she noticed the same thing on her Harold Koopowitz. It starts on the oldest leaves but I'll have to ask her if it spreads to the younger ones as well.

Both Paphs have been quarantined as a precaution.

Since I see virus and mites everywhere right now, I don't dare to give a possible suggestion of what it could be. Does anyone have any idea? These are her most precious Paphs so she doesn't want to throw them away unless it's necessary.

Thanks for any input you might have.
 
Well, it is a bad news.
I had the exact same thing happened this past summer.
I got hooked on Gloria Naugle and was in search for it.
One day, they came up on eBay and I bought a few.
All of them looked perfectly fine but the underside of the leaves (yes, I'm very thorough and check everywhere for any suspicious marks and presence of bugs) were like your friend's paph.
They all had this, some were worse than others, and the worst one had almost all the leaves affected and the worst leaves had some of these spots appearing on the top side of the leaves as well.
I had no idea as they looked very different from any disease marks I had seen, but apparently they were not normal.
I knew that because one, I already had perfectly "clean" Gloria Naugle, two I have never seen something like this on any of my paphs.

Well, I contacted the seller and she (or he) said how they were in the business for so long and they know that it is nothing to worry about but would refund the money if I sent them back.
Well, I should have sent them back because I was always worrying about the plants looking the way they did.
Well, I kept the plants and the symptom very slowly and steadily got worse and the plants were all in the garbage now.

I bought one more GN from a different seller last year. Well, it had the same issue but very very minimal. So I did not think much of it.
Well, now after about 4 months, it is only getting worse. I cut off the affect leaf right away, but the new leaf will start showing spots shortly after.
I sprayed miticide thinking it might be done by some invisibly small mites of some sort. Well, it did not help, either.
I'm thinking of pictching that one also. I hate it and they give me such headache.
I will just buy a flask of them (if I can find anywhere lol) and start fresh.

I see this similar things on one of my Delrosi.
My HK also shows very slight case of this.
I guess it might be something that many of the parvi X roth hybrids are susceptible to?
Whatever it is, I had the most terrible time ever with plants because of this!
I'm going to pitch them all. Absolutely disgusting!
Well, I need more space for new plants and growing seedlings anyway. :)

No more online shopping, at least unless I ask about the presence of spots on the leaves both underside and top, and have guarantee before buying.
 
yes it looks like insects bites. I had the same on one very much afflicted paph and after a treatment of imidacloprid and floramite, they are gone and the new shoots that are now quite big are all clean of it. There are 3 babies growing from this mother plant and all show no sign of it. I would treat your plants for insects.

Here is a picture of one of mine, showing the old groth fully infested, and the new growth, clean and healthy.

infestee2_zpsd03f1300.jpg
 
yes it looks like insects bites. I had the same on one very much afflicted paph and after a treatment of imidacloprid and floramite, they are gone and the new shoots that are now quite big are all clean of it. There are 3 babies growing from this mother plant and all show no sign of it. I would treat your plants for insects.

Here is a picture of one of mine, showing the old groth fully infested, and the new growth, clean and healthy.

infestee2_zpsd03f1300.jpg

The marks are totally different, not the same at all.
I'm glad that your plant is fine now.
 
Well, it is a bad news.
I had the exact same thing happened this past summer.
I got hooked on Gloria Naugle and was in search for it.
One day, they came up on eBay and I bought a few.
All of them looked perfectly fine but the underside of the leaves (yes, I'm very thorough and check everywhere for any suspicious marks and presence of bugs) were like your friend's paph.
They all had this, some were worse than others, and the worst one had almost all the leaves affected and the worst leaves had some of these spots appearing on the top side of the leaves as well.
I had no idea as they looked very different from any disease marks I had seen, but apparently they were not normal.
I knew that because one, I already had perfectly "clean" Gloria Naugle, two I have never seen something like this on any of my paphs.

Well, I contacted the seller and she (or he) said how they were in the business for so long and they know that it is nothing to worry about but would refund the money if I sent them back.
Well, I should have sent them back because I was always worrying about the plants looking the way they did.
Well, I kept the plants and the symptom very slowly and steadily got worse and the plants were all in the garbage now.

I bought one more GN from a different seller last year. Well, it had the same issue but very very minimal. So I did not think much of it.
Well, now after about 4 months, it is only getting worse. I cut off the affect leaf right away, but the new leaf will start showing spots shortly after.
I sprayed miticide thinking it might be done by some invisibly small mites of some sort. Well, it did not help, either.
I'm thinking of pictching that one also. I hate it and they give me such headache.
I will just buy a flask of them (if I can find anywhere lol) and start fresh.

I see this similar things on one of my Delrosi.
My HK also shows very slight case of this.
I guess it might be something that many of the parvi X roth hybrids are susceptible to?
Whatever it is, I had the most terrible time ever with plants because of this!
I'm going to pitch them all. Absolutely disgusting!
Well, I need more space for new plants and growing seedlings anyway. :)

No more online shopping, at least unless I ask about the presence of spots on the leaves both underside and top, and have guarantee before buying.
Funny part is that my Delrosi brought something similar into my collection. It turned out to be false spider mites which I am still battling. They've ignored the Delrosi this time around and killed my Neo and chewed on my lowii instead. All the new leaves and the new growth on the Delrosi are blemish free.

I don't know if you also had false spider mites or not, but that seems to be what mine had and what parts of my collection still has.

Interesting that all of us has had it on parvi/roth hybrids.


It looks like sucking insect damage to me. Scale? Spider mites?
I'm glad you said it and not me. Spider mites was my first thought when I saw the damage, but I see mites everywhere right now. She wiped the undersides of the leaves but they came away clean. I'll ask her if she has a magnifier so she can check the plants thoroughly.


Can you get Orthene 97% wettable powder in Sweden?
Unless it's sold under a different name, it doesn't seem like it.


My initial impression is insect damage but an in-focus, close up would help a lot.
I've asked about better pictures, but she said this was the best she could do. I'll ask her again though because it would really help.
 
Think you got me wrong; rust aka iron hydroxide, spots due to iron poisoning. Some species/provenances have a almost allergic reacton to iron. I do not know wheter this could be something like it but..... Also, too acid substrate can make iron and manganese too easily available and turn a normal amount poisonous. If I am not wrong, these hybrids are of species from limestone areas, or regions with low availability of iron sooo
 
That is an interesting idea, Bjorn. If so, raising the pH of the potting medium should prevent a reoccurrence of the symptoms.

Since multiple plants are involved, perhaps we can do an experiment: treat some for fungus and some for iron toxicity and then we see what works... Not a very rigorous experiment, and probably not producing any general hypotheses, but it would be more effective than treating all the plants the same and then seeing them all die because you lost the 50/50 bet on fungus vs toxicity.
 
Sorry Lance, I should have written that according to Roth...... Its not my idea. but it can make sense that some species growing on limecliffs can have a lower tolerance for micronutrients than species that grow acid. Simply due to the solubilty/availability issue. Those on lime must be much more effective in their uptake than those on ultramafic soil (high Fe, high pH) or lower pH soils (easier accessibilty of Fe). But you are right, there is not much to prove that assumption.
 
Sorry Lance, I should have written that according to Roth...... Its not my idea. but it can make sense that some species growing on limecliffs can have a lower tolerance for micronutrients than species that grow acid. Simply due to the solubilty/availability issue. Those on lime must be much more effective in their uptake than those on ultramafic soil (high Fe, high pH) or lower pH soils (easier accessibilty of Fe). But you are right, there is not much to prove that assumption.

It seems logical to me also, that's why I asked if you knew more about it...I'm interested. The use of excess amounts and combinations of different nutrients may be the cause of many instances of "infections". Just like in this case where it looks like insect damage but there are no insects present or it looks like fungus but does not respond to fungicide.
 
Back
Top