The Orchid Garden

Stanhopea oculata flask

Question:

When you are growing seedlings, some plants may seem to be taking an awful long  time to bloom and are much shorter compared to the others.  Make sure these  plants have only one lead growth.  If they are going in 2 or more directions,  they will take their time in getting to blooming size.—Matt

Response:

I seem to recall several stories within orchid culture and in the development of perennial varieties of other genera,  that the vigor of a seedling does not always determine the worthiness of the bloom.  There are stories of runt peonies and rhododendrons that turned out to be spectacular selections of their species,  for the lucky gardener with the patience to nurture them.  A strong seedling can have a dud flower too.  Some of us remember when a yellow clivia cost $2000.  Sometimes you just have to wait until the plant flowers before you can cull.  For commercial growers, culling less vigorous seedlings may be more a factor of the economics of producing the most number of sellable plants in the shortest period of time. — Jaime Rodriguez P.O. Box 871394 Wasilla, Alaska, 99687 USDA Zone 3 & 4 http://www.matnet.com/jaime/ (remove the ! to e-mail me)

Response:

[SNIP]         After this, they’ll grow on to mature plants in, oh… years. I have admittedly never been very good at this step, and I always lose a lot of seedlings. I’m not sure if my behavior is peculiar like that, or if lots of people lose most of their plantlets, but I am willing to admit that, heck- I kill lots of seedlings, some of which waste away. I rarely lose any to rot. Any pointers here? I’d sure like input and options as to how people take their seedlings to flower, esp. in the non-greenhouse environment.         -AJHicks         Orchid Seedbank Project         Socorro, NM

Hi Aaron, Yup. Futzed it up When deflasking, try adding 10 drops of Physan per gallon of water used in the soak. We like to use the 5" square dome compots initially, with a mud or Sphag mix. Melt or drill a few holes in the lid for air circulation. So long as the media is kept damp, these compots can even be kept in a livingroom. We generally lose less than 1-2% of our deflasked seedlings this way, and that includes plantlets hardly past the large protocorm stage…aka, the runts. I think OFE carries the domed compots. -Rod- Venger’s Orchids Website http://www.vengers.com/

Response:

[snip]    After this, they’ll grow on to mature plants in, oh… years. I have admittedly never been very good at this step, and I always lose a lot of seedlings. I’m not sure if my behavior is peculiar like that, or if lots of people lose most of their plantlets, but I am willing to admit that, heck- I kill lots of seedlings, some of which waste away. I rarely lose any to rot. Any pointers here? I’d sure like input and options as to how people take their seedlings to flower, esp. in the non-greenhouse environment.    -AJHicks    Orchid Seedbank Project    Socorro, NM

I use a ten gallon aquarium as a terrarium.  This is placed in the same rack I use for all the mature plants.  It’s under lights (currently a 250 watt MH at about two feet to the side), and has a stick-on heater attached to the bottom which was purchased from  the aquarium shop.  A plastic dome lid (intended for seed flats) fits loosely enough that there is some external air admitted, but the humidity remains high. I’ve not lost a single plant since I’ve started using this method.  In fact, I’m beginning to think it’s too successful.  Where will I put all those plants? Patrick
NOTE: I check the newsgroups every day, so an email reply isn’t needed; however, if you want to reply by email, you will need to remove the slithy nonsense from my address.

Response:

So…from an inquisitive standpoint, does this 98%-99% "success rate" transfer into 100% "bloomers"? Not trying to besmirch the survival methodology, just contemplating the fitness of AHicks survivors versus yours. I suppose another way of putting it would be – if you are a propagator and have extremely limited resources (constraints), on what criteria would you "cull the herd"? To somehow tie this back to the original query regarding 100 seedlings – should every plant be accomodated or should you apply a survivability metric? – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -We generally lose less than 1-2% of our deflasked seedlings this way, and that includes plantlets hardly past the large protocorm stage…aka, the runts. I think OFE carries the domed compots. -Rod- Venger’s Orchids Website http://www.vengers.com/

Response:

Rod/Venger’s Good enough. Thank you. The following is also threadedly intriguing:   – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – But we’re also finding that frequent (every 3 months) repotting will sometimes wake the little ones up and they start to grow normally. This is a rather new discovery for us so we don’t know how it will work out. Venger’s Orchids Website http://www.vengers.com/

Response:

I recently received a flask of about 100 stanhopea oculata seedlings, and I am unsure of the best method to de-flask it.  I am very new to orchid growing and  I don’t want to kill them.  There are maybe 50 or more seedlings in the 250ml  flask. Please feel free to E mail. Thanks ! orchids

Response:

I recently received a flask of about 100 stanhopea oculata seedlings, and I am unsure of the best method to de-flask it.  I am very new to orchid growing and I  don’t want to kill them.  There are maybe 50 or more seedlings in the 250ml flask.

        Heh. One sure way to bring out differences in opinion is to ask how to deflask seedlings. Like anything else in growing orchids, *my* way is the *right* way. So, I’ll happily tell you how I go about it, provided I don’t get any horrible responses about how I do it is all futzed up and everything.         Provided your plantlets are mature enough to survive out of flask (i.e., look like most have some semblance of a root system, leaves are large enough, and so forth- most of which are matters of opinion and experience), you can remove seedlings from flask in one or more ways. The easiest is to smash the flask. Wrap it in a towel or a plastic bag and simply rap it with a hammer right along where the sides meet the bottom- this works well with both Erlenmeyer flasks and mason jars, but mason jars tend to be big enough to pull the seedlings out on their own.         In order to pull seedlings out of flask without breaking it, fill the flask with warm (90-100F) water for an hour or so. This will soften up the agar gel, and (in theory) make them easier to pull out. This is what I usually do, but I have a full compliment of forceps and so forth that can be used to get seedlings from waaaay back in the flask. Investment tip: buy chopsticks.         After this, make sure you dispose of the agar jelly down the sink; it can breed bacteria and fungi very quickly. Although most are harmless, there is the chance that a few might be pathogenic, and should be destroyed.         When removing seedlings from flask, I always float them in a bowl of water. This has several purposes: the first is that it keeps the seedlings hydrated, keeps them from drying out. Secondly, nutrient agar continues to loosen up the longer it sits in water, and you will be picking it off of roots and leaves for a while. Lastly, any bits of glass you may have missed if you broke the flask will sink to the bottom, where they will stay out of the way so you are less likely to cut yourself.         Some people use regular tap water, nice and plain; others insist that SuperThrive or other vitamin formulations help reduce transplant shock. Don’t use fertilizer; it’ll suck water out of the roots and increase the chances of trauma.         Once you have them floating in a bowl, you can then clean them up (remove dead leaves and stray agar gel) and prepare to plant them. Use your favorite mix, but in a grade fine enough to support plantlets. I’ve found that sphagnum moss holds seedlings well. You’ll never really be able to _plant_ anything but the largest, say, 25% of your seedlings; the rest will only have one root- or even none if they’re really small. Forceps or a pencil help here by letting you poke a hole down through the mix, putting in what you can without breaking it, and then adding water to collapse the hole, or otherwise "backfilling" the hole you made. Sphagnum is easier in that it comes in all grades and sizes, and holds a LOT of moisture.         There are many ways to wrangle seedlings like this; some prefer compots, which let you put 20-40 or so seedlings in a rather large (4-6") pot. For smaller batches, I use ice cube trays; melt a hole in the bottom of each well with a soldering iron, or carve one with an X-acto knife. Put it in the side of the well, about 1/4" from the bottom so it retains a *tiny* amount of water on the inside- keeps your seedlings from drying out immediately after watering, especially with such small containers.         After this, they *must* be kept humid. Seedlings dry out very quickly, and after living in 100% humidity most of their lives, they won’t enjoy your living room environs very much. :-/ The problem is, in their nice, sterile environment, they can’t rot. If you plastic bag them to keep them humid, the bacteria and fungi that will cause them to rot have been introduced. You can lose entire flats or trays overnight, which is always distressing. Try to keep them humid, and plastic bag them only if you have to.         After this, they’ll grow on to mature plants in, oh… years. I have admittedly never been very good at this step, and I always lose a lot of seedlings. I’m not sure if my behavior is peculiar like that, or if lots of people lose most of their plantlets, but I am willing to admit that, heck- I kill lots of seedlings, some of which waste away. I rarely lose any to rot. Any pointers here? I’d sure like input and options as to how people take their seedlings to flower, esp. in the non-greenhouse environment.         -AJHicks         Orchid Seedbank Project         Socorro, NM

Response:

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