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Ever since I found Fusarium in my Shelob, I've been eyeing a few other orchids suspiciously. Some months ago one of 22's backbulbs had a purpleish area at the base of the pseudobulb. Today I unpotted it and sliced off a few old backbulbs, and found Fusarium. So I went through the whole surgery thing again. Unlike Shelob, 22 may be salvageable: I did manage to find 2 divisions that had no purple ring. One of them is a single, new pseudobulb, and one is a PB with a new growth.
I wish I had taken a pic of the plant recently. It looked just great. Aside from the discolored PB, there were no signs of Fusarium! The plant was growing vigorously, plump PBs, etc. The same with Shelob, there was no evidence of Fusarium at all, until the rhizome snapped and I saw the purple ring.
I am pretty sure that the fungus spread through shared water. Last summer I had trouble keeping the orchids hydrated, so I was soaking them, and going through so much water, that I kept running out. I shared water, I reasoned that all of my orchids had no sign of disease and I always watered the oldest ones first.
Now I have some suspicion of 25, 26, and 23. I also have a theory that the dreaded orange rot that affects Miltonias and Miltoniopsis is a manifestation of Fusarium. No one seems to know what orange rot is; some ppl say it's a fungus, some a bacteria, some say it's just a result of dehydration. I've lost two plants to orange rot. It stains the PBs and the rhizome orange.
25: just a really slow grower and has some unusual-looking rot in the early brachts at the base of PBs along with some dead leaf tips on new growths. It just looks supicious.
26: the slowest grower in my collection. I've had it a year and it's managed two tiny growths and almost no roots in that time. It lost a backbulb and new growth to rot last fall, and the oldest backbulb isn't looking too hot. it's wizened and has some discoloration on the remaining brachts. I've debated with myself on whether to toss it, but some OA ppl convinced me to keep it.
23: this was my first and only Maxillariella, so I didn't have another one to compare it to. I did discard some stems and bulbs a few weeks ago when I repotted it. But it's not blooming, and a few days ago I saw a new video from a YTer whose Max. Tenuifolia is diseased, and mine looks like it's in the early stages of whatever it wrong with that one. So next week I will probably do extreme surgery on some of those stems as well.
In the fall and winter I treated all the plants with Tebuconazole, which seemed to knock out the rhizoctonia I was dealing with, but obvs it had no effect on the Fusarium. So I just ordered some Thiomyl. I plan to treat al the remaining orchids with Thiomyl and we'll see what happens. I will probably also quarantine the suspicious-looking ones. B is putting up some shelves in the master bath and I can move the suspicious plants in there with a grow light.
I wish I had taken a pic of the plant recently. It looked just great. Aside from the discolored PB, there were no signs of Fusarium! The plant was growing vigorously, plump PBs, etc. The same with Shelob, there was no evidence of Fusarium at all, until the rhizome snapped and I saw the purple ring.
I am pretty sure that the fungus spread through shared water. Last summer I had trouble keeping the orchids hydrated, so I was soaking them, and going through so much water, that I kept running out. I shared water, I reasoned that all of my orchids had no sign of disease and I always watered the oldest ones first.
Now I have some suspicion of 25, 26, and 23. I also have a theory that the dreaded orange rot that affects Miltonias and Miltoniopsis is a manifestation of Fusarium. No one seems to know what orange rot is; some ppl say it's a fungus, some a bacteria, some say it's just a result of dehydration. I've lost two plants to orange rot. It stains the PBs and the rhizome orange.
25: just a really slow grower and has some unusual-looking rot in the early brachts at the base of PBs along with some dead leaf tips on new growths. It just looks supicious.
26: the slowest grower in my collection. I've had it a year and it's managed two tiny growths and almost no roots in that time. It lost a backbulb and new growth to rot last fall, and the oldest backbulb isn't looking too hot. it's wizened and has some discoloration on the remaining brachts. I've debated with myself on whether to toss it, but some OA ppl convinced me to keep it.
23: this was my first and only Maxillariella, so I didn't have another one to compare it to. I did discard some stems and bulbs a few weeks ago when I repotted it. But it's not blooming, and a few days ago I saw a new video from a YTer whose Max. Tenuifolia is diseased, and mine looks like it's in the early stages of whatever it wrong with that one. So next week I will probably do extreme surgery on some of those stems as well.
In the fall and winter I treated all the plants with Tebuconazole, which seemed to knock out the rhizoctonia I was dealing with, but obvs it had no effect on the Fusarium. So I just ordered some Thiomyl. I plan to treat al the remaining orchids with Thiomyl and we'll see what happens. I will probably also quarantine the suspicious-looking ones. B is putting up some shelves in the master bath and I can move the suspicious plants in there with a grow light.
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