Orchid Care with Eileen | Indoor House Plants | The Home Depot

Welcome back everyone. Today we're going to talk about orchids, one of my favorite plants, and they are absolutely exquisite. So all of you plant mothers and fathers out there, we're going to teach you today how to take care of your plants, how to help them live long, live strong, re-bloom, and enjoy them for many years to come. The majority of orchids are perennial epiphytes. That means they naturally grow, they're anchored to trees, and they derive their moisture and nutrients from the air and the rain that happens in the rainforest. They're a member of the tropical and subtropical families. The most common orchids found in your home are the Phalaenopsis. You can find literally hundreds of variations of Phalaenopsis orchids. You can find them in solids, you can find them in stripes, you can find them in speckles, you can find them in multiple tones, you can find them with absolutely exquisite patterns. In fact, there's over 28,000 species and 100,000 hybrids of orchids. So it's no wonder each one's different. Most of your plants you'll purchase when they start to bloom, then they'll continue blooming, and once they're done blooming, they'll take a rest period. They usually bloom once, sometimes twice a year. They can bloom for several weeks or up to several months at a time. Orchids are very special plants because they not only look gorgeous, but they also remove harmful VOCs, those volatile organic compounds in your home, so they make you safe too. As beautiful as an orchid is, it's fairly simple to take care of. Let's talk about what you need to know. First of all, you want to start at the bottom and get a pot. You need to have a pot that has holes. You can see this one. We've got a clay pot here that does have some holes in the side. Your plant will need to be inside of a pot that does have water drainage, but you can place it inside of a decorative pot that doesn't have a hole. But you always want to make sure that your plant has adequate drainage. That is critical. The roots cannot sit in standing water or they'll rot. Your orchid will grow in sphagnum moss, as you see here, or it can use a specialized orchid potting mix, which includes bark, gravel, and other large components. You should never ever plant your orchid in an indoor potting mix or a garden soil mix. Let me tell you why. As you can see, there are these beautiful long roots. This is how the plant receives moisture, air, and nutrients. If you use a traditional soil, the soil will bind the roots up. The roots will not be able to breathe and obtain the air and the moisture that they need, and the plant will suffocate and die. Let's take a look at these roots. As you can see, they are quite long, and they're really tightly bound. In the wild, they would actually be bound to the top of a tree or limb, and that would be how they would anchor the orchid to the substrate. But since your plant's indoors, it doesn't have a tropical rainforest, so the best we can do is a specialized potting mix or the sphagnum moss. And as you can see, as I take the sphagnum moss away from the roots, we've got quite a network going on here. Let's go ahead and just check out the health of these roots. Healthy roots means a healthy plant. As you can see here, some of these are very nice and lovely and green. Some of these are actually brown. And let's see, this one has a kink, and it's dead. So what I recommend is that you trim it off just above the portion that's deceased. You always want to try and repot your plant every year or so just to give it fresh nutrients and check the roots. When you use pruners, make sure that they're sterilized, and you especially want to make sure you sterilize between plants. You don't want to cross-contaminate between your species. Now that we've taken the sphagnum moss and material away from the roots, we want to make sure that our plant has not outgrown its pot. You want to make sure that the root mass will properly fit inside the container, but not fit too tightly. In this case, it does fairly well. We'll add the medium in a few moments. If the root ball were significantly larger, you would want to replace it and get a larger pot. You want to go one to two inches larger and not much more. The orchid is now ready to be repotted. You definitely want to apply some new sphagnum moss, or in this case, we're going to use some potting mix. You want to go ahead and open it up, and make sure the inside of the roots have some potting mix, and fold the roots over. I'm going to stick it back in its original container. It doesn't matter whether you use the sphagnum moss, or the orchid bark, or potting mix. Just make sure whenever you do clean out the roots, you completely take out all the old medium, and then replenish with fresh. You want to repot it every year to two, give it fresh nutrients. Another quick point is, as you water every week or so, your plant will enjoy the water, but the water will start to degrade, and decompose the potting medium. Over time, the potting medium will actually form into a soil, and that will constrict the roots, and cause it to absorb too much water, which will lead to root rot. Now that we repotted the orchid, it's time to water it. I like to water it thoroughly, and as we mentioned, the roots cannot sit in standing water, or they'll rot. So the most important thing is to make sure it's fully drained. I'm going to go ahead and pull out the pot, and a lot of water in the beautiful pot. I like to make sure that it drains thoroughly. The whole point of the exercise is to make sure that the medium gets wet, gets moistened, and it will give the appropriate amount of water, and nutrients to the roots. This way you can't over water. We're not done taking care of this beautiful little orchid. As you can see, there's a stake, what appears to be a dead leaf stem, and a little clip. These are actually little orchid clips, which are like little hair bows. Since this plant's already bloomed through, and as you can see, the stake is pretty well dead, I'm just going to trim it off close to the base, and the plant will be able to rest. It'll go through several month period, where it'll be repurposing itself, it'll be getting ready to start the next bloom cycle. Just be patient, and give it some love and water. This orchid is in full bloom, and it's using a lot of nutrients and water. Whenever you do water this plant, on a weekly or 7-10 day basis, you'll want to add a quarter solution of an orchid food. Make sure you use a food or fertilizer that's specific for orchids. A traditional indoor house plant food will not have all the micronutrients needed for this beautiful orchid. Always follow the manufacturer's instructions for the correct dilution and rate of application. You want to make sure you put this plant in a bright light environment. No direct sunlight, no low light. It can have some filtered light if you're placing it in a south-facing window. Artificial light's okay too. Just make sure it's a fairly bright light. And also remember, your plant likes a warm environment. Temperatures between 60 and 70, maybe 80 degrees. You want to avoid draft, no cold spaces. You want to make sure that the plant is not subjected to sudden temperature drops. Keep them away from hot air registers and cool vents. Humidity is very important to orchids. You want to have at least 50% relative humidity in your home. It's also best for you too. Low humidity can present a problem for the orchids. It may drop leaves, it may turn brown. So if you find that you've got a very low humidity home, if you aren't able to increase the humidity, you may want to put the plant in a gravel tray and add water. The water will increase the local humidity near the leaves of the orchid, but it won't harm the roots, which is the most important thing. Once the plants bloom through, sometimes they have a tendency to go dull or turn brown. You want to remove the brown leaves, but these green leaves look a little dull. So let's give them a little bit of leaf shine just to make them look pretty. I like to spray the leaf shine, especially for plants like this, onto a towel or a soft cloth and then wipe it on the plant. I just think it makes a better presentation and it makes sure that I get all parts of the leaf. An occasional mist is often very much appreciated by your orchid. You definitely want to use water, not necessarily tap water and not distilled water. If you do have to use tap water, make sure you let the water sit for about 24 hours to make sure that no impurities are passed onto your plant. Over the next few weeks and months, your plant's going to continue to grow. Every week as you water it and perhaps in between, you want to just check, look inside the plant itself, look under the leaves and check the top roots. You want to be inspecting to see if there's any bugs, mealybugs, scale, any sort of insect or pest that might be attacking your plant. Spider mites and mealybugs have a tendency to have white dots and then they'll form what looks like either a small cotton mask or possibly a small spider web. If you do find something, make sure you pull the plant away from others, quarantine it and treat it properly. Make sure you check other plants nearby to make sure that they've not been infected. In a few months, your plant should start to grow. You will see a small brack come up, which will be the new stem, which eventually will bring new flowers. You want to make sure you increase the amount of watering and you also want to increase the amount of fertilization. With proper care, you can enjoy your plant for many years. You can find out more information as well as purchase plants at our Home Depot stores. Make sure you check out our helpful how-tos, watch our playlist and subscribe to our channel. You'll be able to find more about this project at The Home Depot.