Trouble with Paul Parks

[Roth]

Iron toxicity, it was typical of the old sanderianum wild plants and some of their hybrids... It happened easily too in a sour or acid media ( the iron availability increases). It is genetic.

Increase the liming very heavily, repot, avoid any sphag or anything that could make the media acid from now. I got this long time ago, now I control it, and I still have plant that can be susceptible to it. If you grow them with proper liming, the media never becomes acid, the plants will be fine.

It is not a virus, guaranteed, so no need to spend money for nothing. It is not temperature, or I would have killed all of my multis plants this summer ( went up to 40 degrees celsius for a couple of weeks, with three peaks at 42, no damages nowhere...).


Eggshells problem is very different, could be a latent infection, or local injury...

 

[Shiva]

Could well be the explanation Borat! I did add some iron to my plants last summer when a couple of phrags came up with whitish leaves. I was very careful with the amount but this plant was new to my collection and had not been repotted yet in my neutral mix (6.2 water pH). As I said previously, none of the other plants showed this symptom and all the whitish growhts in my phrags turned back green.
The plant has since been repotted and let's hope all the damage has been done already. Thanks for your insight.

 

[SlipperKing]

Rick, how is your plant now?

Still scared but growing nicely on the top!

 

[Leo Schordje]

Myself, when I see that sort of damage, I would first treat for both false and true spider mites. Then repot the plant checking the roots for issues. Spray again if mealies or spider mites or any other pests are found.

Treat for spider mites especially if more than one plant is affected. Old spider mite damage is susceptible to all manner of secondary rots and infections. As a result of these secondary rots, the damaged plant can look like it was suffering from something completely unrelated to spider mites, even though the mites were the original cause. When the mites are active, they are so small that most of us over 40 (or 50) just can't see them. Their damage might not always look like the textbook images. Many growers (not all) have chronic low level infestations that will flare up on a few plants every now and then until environmental factors or spraying knocks them back under control.

Second, of the possible causes proposed, Roth's (Xavier's) explanation seems to me to be more likely than virus, though virus is not entirely off the list. Repotting and adding lime to your mix will take care of that. Being cautious about using micro nutrients is advisable, many plants have specific sensitivities. Dilute Dilute Dilute is key when applying micro-nutrients.

My 2 cents.

 

[Potterychef]

Just wanted to put in my two cents. Roth's assessment of iron toxicity makes good sense to me. I had exactly the the same looking issue on a p. Lady Rothschild x sanderianum. Same circumstances...plant was missed during repotting and mix went sour. Plant has since been repotted and seems to be holding its own, but looks a mess. And, it was the only plant this happened to, the other 30 or so primary-ish sanderianum hybrids had all been repotted and look great. Doug

 

[Roth]

Leo is right for the mites, but I would not think about it if only that plant is affected and because it is a sanderianum hybrid. I got few dozen sanderianum like that a decade ago, and it was iron toxicity.

This said, the mites stories can be really much of an headache. I have seen symptoms as chlorotic leaves with dark green 'spots' that came from tarsonemid mites, they kindly sit in the crown, do their job, and the leaves emerge with those dark green spots. If you do not break the crown, you never see any mites. Pleated leaves can come from mites too, and chlorotic/necrotic patches as well, with no sign of mites. A large group of mites attack orchids, and there are not many pictures of symptoms on orchids ( except a few on Hark website). Tarsonemid mites, cyclamen mites, even some types of dust mites, they all hide, make damages and cannot be spotted on the leaves. Another misconception is that mites 'hate' humidity. I have seen wild sangii and mastersianum covered with brevipalpus mites out of the jungle, dendrobium vexillarius, dendrobium malvicolor from Java, cuthbertsonii, some phalaenopsis...



Many mites in fact are to be found in extremely humid weather.

For mites, bromopropylate was the best miticide, followed by dicofol and pentac. aldicarb works nicely as long as there is no resistance. Propargite works really well, but I heard people destroyed many plants with it (Omite), though I never got a problem with it.

Nematodes are another very bad pest, I have seen it infrequently, it is spectacular, hard to diagnose, usually makes some sort of 'tumor' or gall/tumor like patches of tissues.

 

[nikv]

When I read the title of this thread, I immediately thought of the Hitchcock movie "The Trouble with Harry". In the later case, the trouble was that he was dead. I hope that this orchid recovers from it's malady and doesn't suffer the same fate.

 

[Shiva]

When I read the title of this thread, I immediately thought of the Hitchcock movie "The Trouble with Harry". In the later case, the trouble was that he was dead. I hope that this orchid recovers from it's malady and doesn't suffer the same fate.

So do I.
I put it in my Orchid window and it looks ok for now.
Although it's always a possibility I never saw mites on the plant, not even with a 15x magnifying lighting lens. There is absolutely no damage at all under the leaves. Only above.

See: Left is over, right is under: