Orchid Care – The Basics
It is an amazing feeling to receive your very first orchid. You have a beautiful thing in front of you that you can admire… but now you are responsible for it. It is up to you to know some orchid care techniques so that you can look after it properly. If you do look after it properly then it will live for many years. If you don’t… well it could die quite quickly.
The whole subject of orchid care seems quite daunting for beginners. Other plants are known to be easier to take care of. It is true that they require a bit more work but you will soon get the hang of it.
The area of orchid care where most people go wrong is watering. I think that this is the hardest thing for people to get and if they don’t then there will be disastrous effects. The reason people go wrong is they want to do too much. They have the feeling of wanting to water all the time. This is bad for the orchid. You only water an orchid if the soil is completely dry. You will find that this is once a week at most.
Knowing when to re-pot your orchid can be tricky. Like watering, you don’t need to change their pot as much as you might think. You should aim to do your re-potting in the spring time. You should only consider doing it at other times of the year if the circumstances are exceptional. You should get a pot that is too large for your orchid. It likes to have its roots packed in.
Orchids love the sunlight. One of your tasks in orchid care is positioning the orchid correctly. Although they do like lots of light, you shouldn’t keep them in direct in the sunlight for extended periods.
I hope that I haven’t put you off getting your first orchid. It really is a great experience and with a little orchid care it should prosper very well. Good luck!