Hello everyone! I don't have a lot of experience with plants, especially not a whole orchid, but I was gifted one recently. This one in particular is a Phalaenopsis orchid. After I got it, I placed it in a room with indirect sunlight and made sure to check if the pot had drainage holes, which the inner pot thankfully had. I removed the inner, plastic pot from the outside one and noticed that there was a lot of water at the bottom of the outside pot, so I dumped it out. I'm not exactly sure how long the water was sitting at the bottom of the pot, but I was wondering if that may have negatively affected the orchid. I noticed these small, dark brown spots on the leaves that go pretty deep. The petals of the flowers also seem to have small holes in them. Is there anything I can do to help this orchid?

It could be mechanical damage, I would not sweat the small stuff. However, the drowned roots are something else. Orchids with dead roots decline for a long time before they finally give up the ghost. Never allow water to sit for even an hour around their roots. Keep them warm and moist. You should have them so you can water them every day if you want (almost ideal) without worrying about drowning roots. Healthy roots are white or green w/yellow or green ends usually.

Fertilize them weakly weekly. That is, weak dose of fertilizer 1X/wk. Put it with another plant so it drains into that if you can. When bloom fades, avoid fert for some time unless it puts out another flower spike. BTW, the roots have a fungus in them that makes the food for the plant. Kill the fungus (fungicide, chemicals like alcohol) and the plant dies.

leafypete said:It could be mechanical damage, I would not sweat the small stuff. However, the drowned roots are something else. Orchids with dead roots decline for a long time before they finally give up the ghost. Never allow water to sit for even an hour around their roots. Keep them warm and moist. You should have them so you can water them every day if you want (almost ideal) without worrying about drowning roots. Healthy roots are white or green w/yellow or green ends usually.

Fertilize them weakly weekly. That is, weak dose of fertilizer 1X/wk. Put it with another plant so it drains into that if you can. When bloom fades, avoid fert for some time unless it puts out another flower spike. BTW, the roots have a fungus in them that makes the food for the plant. Kill the fungus (fungicide, chemicals like alcohol) and the plant dies.

Thanks for responding, that was really helpful! Yeah, I'm thinking the water was there for several hours before I found out. Although, I think there is a bit of a gap between the bottoms of both pots, so I'm hoping that the roots had very little contact with the water. I didn't know about that fungus thing, thank you for mentioning it. I'll see what I can do to fertilize it weakly each week. ^^

The roots do not have a fungus on/in them. The white or light gray covering is called velamin. These are special cells that allow the orchid to adhere to a host plant. This type of orchid is an epiphyte meaning it attaches to a host plant for support only.
As you water healthy roots, the gray should briefly change to greenish gray. Any root that is firm and either white, gray or cream colored is healthy.
Phalaenopsis should not stand in water. It drowns roots and they die and the plant suffers. It grows in media like sphagnum moss or a bark mix, NEVER IN SOIL. Most of the roots look fine now. Phalaenopsis should be repotted into fresh media every year or two. They respond with a growth spurt of new roots and leaves.
They flower generally once a year from December through April.
No direct sun, just a bright windowsill. Water one day for every inch of pot. A 4" plant water every four days to start. 5" pot, every five days.
If you fertilize often you run the risk of root burn and no flowers. I fertilize all of my orchids three or four times a year. They do not require a lot of food.

Holes in the flowers are likely caused by Bush snails, they are very tiny and come out after dark. They live in the media. The sunken black spots are of no concern unless they grow and get bigger. It is cosmetic damage.

They are native from India through all of Southeast Asia. Their roots can grow to over 3 meters in length and can be hard to confine to a pot.
FOR MORE INFORMATION: visit the American Orchid Society website at www.aos.org where you can find culture sheets on how to grow Phalaenopsis.
OR visit the Orchid Forums found on this site. We have numerous threads dealing with growing Phalaenopsis with questions, answers and images.

BigBill said:The roots do not have a fungus on/in them. The white or light gray covering is called velamin. These are special cells that allow the orchid to adhere to a host plant. This type of orchid is an epiphyte meaning it attaches to a host plant for support only.
As you water healthy roots, the gray should briefly change to greenish gray. Any root that is firm and either white, gray or cream colored is healthy.
Phalaenopsis should not stand in water. It drowns roots and they die and the plant suffers. It grows in media like sphagnum moss or a bark mix, NEVER IN SOIL. Most of the roots look fine now. Phalaenopsis should be repotted into fresh media every year or two. They respond with a growth spurt of new roots and leaves.
They flower generally once a year from December through April.
No direct sun, just a bright windowsill. Water one day for every inch of pot. A 4" plant water every four days to start. 5" pot, every five days.
If you fertilize often you run the risk of root burn and no flowers. I fertilize all of my orchids three or four times a year. They do not require a lot of food.

Holes in the flowers are likely caused by Bush snails, they are very tiny and come out after dark. They live in the media. The sunken black spots are of no concern unless they grow and get bigger. It is cosmetic damage.

They are native from India through all of Southeast Asia. Their roots can grow to over 3 meters in length and can be hard to confine to a pot.
FOR MORE INFORMATION: visit the American Orchid Society website at www.aos.org where you can find culture sheets on how to grow Phalaenopsis.
OR visit the Orchid Forums found on this site. We have numerous threads dealing with growing Phalaenopsis with questions, answers and images.

That was very thoughtful and informative, thank you! It's reassuring to hear that the orchid doesn't have a fungus in it or any other problems. And yeah, I was thinking the petal holes might've been caused by some sort of pest. There seem to be different ideas for how often to fertilize orchids, so I'm glad you shared your advice. ^^ I'll be sure to make use of those links you provided as well!

My pleasure. Good luck with your orchid!!

BigBill, when you write "The roots do not have a fungus on/in them", that is incorrect. Fungus are necessary for healthy orchids. This from one site about orchids and fungi:

"Symbioses are ubiquitous in nature and influence individual plants and populations. Orchids have life history stages that depend fully or partially on fungi for carbon and other essential resources. As a result, orchid populations depend on the distribution of orchid mycorrhizal fungi (OMFs). We focused on evidence that local-scale distribution and population dynamics of orchids can be limited by the patchy distribution and abundance of OMFs, after an update of an earlier review confirmed that orchids are rarely limited by OMF distribution at geographic scales. Recent evidence points to a relationship between OMF abundance and orchid density and dormancy, which results in apparent density differences. Orchids were more abundant, less likely to enter dormancy, and more likely to re-emerge when OMF were abundant."
Also, this:
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub...

Just google microrrhiza and orchids and you'll have weeks worth of reading.

Orchid seeds and germination: yes, fungi play very large part in that process. Recent studies do indicate that certain orchids have specific fungi associated with them that together, helps that orchids seeds to germinate guaranteeing greater success in the wild!
Once such study is going on in conjunction with the Naples Orchid Society and the students under Professor Larry Richardson of Illinois College in Jacksonville Illinois regarding the ghost orchid in south Florida. Recently, the last 7-8 years has seen that study expand to the shores of Cuba with Professor Mujica and the re-establishing of 6 orchid species now extinct in Florida but yet still found in Cuba. Another species is the cigar or Cow's Horn Orchid, Cryptopodium punctatum. It is in the Oncidium Alliance.
It was thought for many a year that the Ghost Orchid, Dendrophylax lindenii would only grow on Pond Apple trees and Pop Ash in the Everglades. Yet at the Naples Botanical Garden, they are growing and flowering on nothing more then wet burlap.

While I lived there, I was a $$ supporter of their efforts and got the pleasure of meeting Dr. Ernesto Mujica. He gifted me some absolutely great coffee from Cuba as well as a book on native Cuban Orchids. What a pleasure that was. I think back on this often, me a boy who grew up in the Cold War Era, Cuban Missile Crisis, shaking hands with some body from Cuba. Yikes!! Orchid People look past that stuff I guess!

But to contrast that, a mature blooming orchid like a Phalaenopsis no longer has a need for a fungal association in orchid to grow and flower. I have orchids in my collection for over 20 years and they do just fine without any fungus.
But, if I wanted to produce and raise viable seed, that is where a specific fungus introduced into the media within the 'mother flask' would prove to be a great benefit. Much better than the old days using agar mixed with banana.

Just one more post. Orchids are associated with microrrhizzae all their lives. From an orchid site:

"Orchid plants have an obligatory parasitic life stage at germination where all of their nutrients must be supplied by a fungus. After germination, the orchid mycorrhizal interactions will become specialized to utilize the carbon and nutrients available in the environment surrounding the interaction. These associations are often thought to be dictated by the plant It has been indicated in past studies that orchid plant individuals which inhabit dense highly shaded forests may depend significantly more on their fungal partner for carbon, varying within and between species, demonstrating the variable and reactive nature of these interaction."

This from The Smithsonian:
"Orchids and mycorrhizal fungi have a complex symbiotic association where each of the orchid's life stages are dependent at some level on specific fungi. In the earliest stages, orchids rely entirely on their mycorrhizal fungi for all nutrients, including carbon."

So, yes, fungi are associated with most orchids for all their life. I'm done here. Have a good life.

@leafypete

Hi and welcome to the Orchid forum!
Thanks for dispensing your knowledge so freely! I am just a bit curious, are you holding out on us? Do you by any chance grow a ton of beautiful Orchids, which you are not sharing with us?
....waiting for some nice pictures....