regnum-plantae:

Blooming sequence on my Dendrobium nobile

It is now the second time I see my salvaged Dedrobium nobile orchid flowering under my care and it’s becoming an event I look forward to, just to know what happens next. Last year it produced nine flowers on the two old canes it had when I bought it, spent and reduced to 50p, and then it grew two stunted, small new canes that never fully developed. This year it managed to grow two large canes which stopped growing just short of completely unfurling the top three leaves, we aren’t blessed with the longest of growing seasons here in Scotland. On one of them, it produced nine flowers again, and two new canes are already a few centimetres long. About three months ago I tried to improve its situation in a diy-ish way by repotting it into a cut plastic bottle in which I pierced holes to improve aeration. The mix I used to loosely fill the space around most of the roots is bark, some sandy compost and…packing chips. I had a handful of them and thought I could try to use them as a filler and see what would happen. I’ve been misting it daily at night, when the heating is on, and I water it thoroughly once a week. For the moment everything is going well!