Hello everyone. The orchid seems looks healthy, and has recently bloomed, but some leaves have some kind of wrinkes. What may have caused these?
Re: rubbery leaves on orchid I've seen this condition from time to time and was once told by a large grower in South Florida it is caused by excess chemicals in the tissue culture process. Many commercially sold orchids are not grown from seeds but are instead created in a lab by taking a tissue sample from a parent plant and creating a chemical "soup" that contains DNA that is used for commercial growing purposes. Tissue culture is the asexual propagation of fragments of a suitable parent plant in order to produce clones of it in large quantity. In the process cells are grown in nutrient solutions in a laboratory until they form a mass of tissue. These then receive different chemicals to induce roots and leaves. Once developed the tiny plants are transplanted into a potting medium and those from a commercial lab are normally distributed to the commercial plant growing industry. The process apparently cuts approximately two years off the time it takes to make a plant bloom. Some eventually outgrow the condition.
Interesting - I've never heard of that. Do you have the name of the plant or maybe a pic of the flowers? If it is a Miltonia type or Oncidium, I'd say it is as simple as low humidity. They are prone to get crinckly leaves if the humidity is too low. No worries, it just doesn't look nice.
That is also correct. If it is due to low humidity the condition may be difficult to correct in a home situation, however if it was purchased that way commercial growers normally know how to control this in their greenhouse which makes me suspect a tissue culture problem.
Here is the orchid, I'm not sure what kind it is, most likely, a hybrid. Indeed, the humidity is rather low (33% right now).
Your plant is a hybrid - no way to tell which for sure. What I can say, is that it looks along the lines of Miltassia, which means it has Miltonia in it - one of the genera that is prone to wrinkly leaves. Miltassia is Brassia x Miltonia. If the picture you posted is when you first got it, and the wrinkly leaves just appeared, what I would suggest is to put the pot on top of (not in) a tray of water. Put some pebbles or something in the tray to raise the pot up, then fill the trya with water. This will provide a little humidity around the plant. Not a whole lot you can do in the house, though, but you can try.
We bought the orchid about about a year ago, and the wrinkled leaves started appearing recenly. So far, not many of them. I'll try to increase the humidiy with the water tray. Thanks to you both.
No problem. If you need more help, try contacting the southern ontario orchid society: http://www.soos.ca/ since you are in Toronto.
