Journal March 9, 2017 - Another orchid flask

Today I received and planted another hobby flask.  This one contained at least 25 plants and the total cost including shipping was about twenty-five dollars.  The above photo shows the flask immediately after I received it.  

The seedlings are Epidendrum magnoliae x cattleya alaorii, a cross that should prove interesting, when grown to maturity they will definitely be worth more than a dollar each. 

Once again I planted the larger plants separately and grouped the smaller plants four to a pot.  For the larger plants, I used long fiber sphagnum and for the smaller plants, I used shredded sphagnum.

As this tray will be in a cooler environment I placed a heat mat under the tray.  Also, I decided to use just the vegetative setting on the LED grow light to see if that encouraged faster growth.

Journal March 7, 2017 - Deflasking orchids

If you have patience and are not in a hurry purchasing a hobby flask is one way of obtaining orchids inexpensively.  Of course, you are going to get about twenty-five plants all the same, so it is even better if you can share the cost with a few other growers. 

With that said, I recently purchased two hobby flasks and intend to invest some time in growing the plants to flowering size, with the goal of selling them at one of the orchid society meetings sometime in the future.

After receiving the flask I removed them from the vessel and removed the agar while also separating the plants by rinsing them under tepid water in the sink.  I was fortunate in that the plants separated easily without breaking off any of the fragile roots.  In the flask that I received there were about thirty plants, so the cost per plant was slightly over a dollar.

 The lab recommended planting in long fibered sphagnum moss and keeping the humidity high for the first few weeks.

Not wanting to waste a single plant, my assistant with tiny fingers was assigned the job of planting the small plants,

The variation in the size of the plants in the flask was a surprise.

It was recommended that the plantlets be kept in high humidity for the first few weeks, then to gradually acclimate them to more normal growing conditions.  Spraying the inside of the dome, not the plants, will keep the humidity at an acceptable level.  Feeding, if at all, should be very light, about quarter strength.

At some point,  I want to hybridize orchids, so I am attempting to germinate Phalaenopsis seeds.  I have already cross-pollinated a few flowers but while the seed pods mature I am trying to germinate some seeds I purchased on eBay.

The seeds are very tiny and difficult to work,  they are best sterilized in a syringe and placed in the vessel using the syringe. 

After planting the seeds I thought it best to use a microscope to check the detritus before I discarded it.  As it turned out, there were more seeds in the detritus than I has planted, so I sterilized the whole mess and placed it on media in a vessel.

It is a matter of finding a procedure that works best for you and your conditions.

Journal March 2, 2017 - Orchids are coming into bloom.

I thought I'd mention that the orchids are coming into bloom and share some photos on my blog.  After all, it is a shame to have these beauties and not share them with those who might appreciate them.

Why mention them on a hydroponic blog?  Well, orchids grow in an inert media in a symbiotic relationship with mycelium.  They take no nourishment from the media they are planted in or on but must be fed periodically, just like plants in hydroponic systems.

Just for fun, I prepared media today to start Phalaenopsis seeds using tissue culture procedures.  As I have no experience in starting orchids from seed this should prove interesting.

To be safe I will start hundreds of tiny seeds, but I have no idea of what I would do with hundreds of tiny orchids.  

Journal - February 10, 2017 Olive trees blooming.

In an attempt to keep the olive trees from blooming indoors in the winter and let them bloom in the spring outdoors I kept the photoperiod to the daylight hours of the winter solstice.

In spite of my efforts, they are beginning to bloom anyway. 

In their natural environment, they bloom in late spring, however, each year my trees bloom in late January or early February.

The trees are not exposed any natural light, as they are in grow tents, so all I can think of is that they must have some internal trigger that tells them it is time bloom. It is not an aberration, as the varieties I have are from several parts of the world and mostly all are beginning to bloom.

So, I guess the answer is to increase the light cycle to 16 hours per day, grab a brush, and hand pollinate them.

Not complaining, just an observation that we will never understand plants completely.

Journal - Using a trail camera for bird photography

Yeah, I am digressing from hydroponic gardening with this post, however, I thought I would share a technique that I recently tried.  The technique is to capture wild birds without much effort on the photographer's part using a trail camera, sort of letting them take selfies.

Oh, and yeah, I have a few hydroponic projects going on, but the olive trees are taking up so much room in the basement I am very limited.

On to bird photography, another pastime to occupy my retirement hours.  Instead of sitting outside freezing my butt off in the cold I decided to use my Stealthcam trail camera to photograph birds, automatically.

In order to accomplish this I purchased an inexpensive set of close up lenses on eBay.  As I recall they were about twenty dollars, delivered. 

In order to have a natural looking environment I scoured the woods looking for a tree stump that I could cut a depression in to hold something to attact the birds.  Next, using one of Ava's elastic hair bands, I attached a close up lens to my trail camera and set if  for photos.

After a few days of using the stump to feed the birds I found that they would feed from it even though I was moving it around the property trying to select the right background.

For the photos I found that a #2 lens at a distance of 20" gives excellent results, but you should experiment if you decide to try this.

Below are photos of my setup and results.

Journal August 14, 2016 - Olive cuttings in sand

The olive trees are enjoying our very hot summer outdoors on the deck; so much so that I am going to have to prune every one of them before I can think of returning them to the greenhouse this fall.

Somewhere I had read an abstract comparing the success rate with olive cuttings with various media.  According to one abstract,  the best success rate was obtained using simply sand.

As I am lightly pruning the trees anyway, I decided to try a few cuttings using sand as the rooting media.  This of course is an ideal time to take cuttings with the trees actively growing. 

Four cuttings were struck, dipped in rooting hormone and placed in moist sand exactly one month ago on July 14, 2016.  A dome over the cuttings maintains a high humidity level,  while the heat mat provides essential bottom heat.  A 150 watt multi-spectrum LED grow light with a photoperiod of 16 hours is being used for this trial.

As of today, not a single leaf has dropped from any of the cuttings, so all is looking well at this point.

The Arbequina olive tree had six olives at the top of the tree that were turning purple, so I decided to cure them in brine as a test.  To debitter the olives they were soaked in water that was changed twice a day for three days before being placed in the brine.  A slice of lemon, some red pepper flakes and fresh thyme was placed in the brine to flavor the olives.  A thin layer of olive oil was poured over the brine before the jar was covered.   They have to cure until early September and I am really looking forward to tasting them.

The cucumbers and tomatoes that were growing in the greenhouse are finished and have been removed.  The greenhouse will be cleaned in the next few days and made ready for the olives and figs in the fall.

This was the best season ever for greenhouse tomatoes though.

Journal July 19, 2016 - Greenhouse Harvest

We have already had several tomatoes from both the garden and the greenhouse.  The greenhouse tomatoes are much much larger than the garden tomatoes; so much so that I have had to remove some of the fruit before it ripens to prevent the weight from pulling the truss from the plant.

The taste of a tomato still warm from the plant brings summer to life for me.  After the season I most likely will not eat another tomato until next season.  I don't know why they even bother to grow greenhouse tomatoes during the winter.

As I think about it, if I can grow fantastic tomatoes in my greenhouse, why the hell can commercial growers not grow a comparable tomato in the winter?  The answer must be: money, of course.

The above photo illustrates why I am growing only tropic tomatoes in the greenhouse.  After several years of trying other varieties I have found that tropic works best for my conditions.  Still, today a man gave me seeds from Italy, so I will start a few next year for the garden and see what they are like.

Another batch of dill pickles is underway in the crock, and, I also have four olive cuttings planted in just plain old builder's sand.  

So far the cuttings look fine, while the sand should definitely eliminate fungus gnats, as there is no organic matter to sustain them.