how to grow Pogonia ophioglossoides
Jun 12, 2023 15:39:24 GMT -5
hcarlton, iglacy, and 1 more like this
Post by meizzwang on Jun 12, 2023 15:39:24 GMT -5
Truthfully, these are the Drosera capensis of the orchid world, except so far, they don't seem to spread like crazy via seed, so maybe they're a bit more containable. Also, they're a bit more showy IMO, especially when they produce tons of flowers.
Healthy starts makes ALL the difference in the world! When I acquired these several years ago, the plants were in steep decline, had black, necrotic lesions on the stems/roots, and overall looked so bad. They were nursed back to health, but took a solid 2 years to gain serious growth momentum. During that time, they NEVER flowered at all! This past winter, I "roughed up" a few divisions from my mother tray, stuffed them into small pots, and right now, those are already blooming! It just goes to show, if you start off with good material, it'll save a lot of time and effort.
What I've also learned is that you can acquire these plants during the summer bare root ONLY if the plants are fully established and they won't skip a beat! If they were recently divided during the summer. During the winter dormancy period, as long as the divisions are from healthy plants, you can be really rough with them and literally tear them off the mother plant and they'll turn out nice! that's what I did with these divisions pictured below, they were divided last winter, stuffed into a pot, buried about half an inch under the soil, and they didn't skip a beat!
Pogonia ophioglossoides is very much like a carnivorous plant: these plants prefer growing in a nutrient poor substrate like long fibered sphagnum moss, although I grow them in 100% peat. Rain, distilled, or reverse osmosis water only, as they are quite sensitive to high nutrient levels in the soil. However, you for sure want to feed them! During the grow season, give them 1/4 to 1/5 strength maxsea 16-16-16 (you can probably use orchid fertilizers too), and feed them 2X a month, directly into the soil or water that the pots sit into. In late summer to early fall or whenever you stop seeing new growth emerge, stop feeding them.
While they can stand full sun, I think they do best in filtered sun. Mine are located in an open field that gets blasting full sun from sun up till sun set, but they're surrounded by Sarracenia, so they do get shaded a little bit.
Water-wise, I like to grow them like S. leucophylla: keep the soil hydrated at all times, but not waterlogged. They can probably grow waterlogged and can likely tolerate it, but that is one way to get disease issues, so I don't mess with waterlogging them. In situ, they grow in a wide range water levels, from super boggy to damp but never totally dry. That said, the physics of plants in the ground is very different than potted plants, so it's not the best comparison.
Temperature-wise, they're not picky: it's been like winter this whole spring and they're still growing quite strong! They probably prefer warmer temperatures and for sure they can tolerate a wide range of temperatures during the grow season so long as they are acclimated to a specific range (eg. don't expose a plant growing at 70F to 110F all of the sudden).
Around November, the leaves will completely die down to the roots, and all you'll see are these wispy roots dominating the soil, like a fully root bound Sarracenia! The roots will have little growth points on them which will eventually turn into leaves that will bust out flowers the next spring! I keep them outdoors all year round, and the tray freezes solid down to about 21F at the coldest. Below that, they probably should be protected.
If you do plant these in a bog, be sure to restrict where they can grow, otherwise they will eventually colonize the entire bog!
Anyways, some pictures of Pogonia ophioglossoides, pics taken 6/12/23:
The "leaves" (which are probably modified stems, I don't know) on my plants are sort of small, probably because they get a lot of light. I think they'd get a bit bigger if given part shade.
Healthy starts makes ALL the difference in the world! When I acquired these several years ago, the plants were in steep decline, had black, necrotic lesions on the stems/roots, and overall looked so bad. They were nursed back to health, but took a solid 2 years to gain serious growth momentum. During that time, they NEVER flowered at all! This past winter, I "roughed up" a few divisions from my mother tray, stuffed them into small pots, and right now, those are already blooming! It just goes to show, if you start off with good material, it'll save a lot of time and effort.
What I've also learned is that you can acquire these plants during the summer bare root ONLY if the plants are fully established and they won't skip a beat! If they were recently divided during the summer. During the winter dormancy period, as long as the divisions are from healthy plants, you can be really rough with them and literally tear them off the mother plant and they'll turn out nice! that's what I did with these divisions pictured below, they were divided last winter, stuffed into a pot, buried about half an inch under the soil, and they didn't skip a beat!
Pogonia ophioglossoides is very much like a carnivorous plant: these plants prefer growing in a nutrient poor substrate like long fibered sphagnum moss, although I grow them in 100% peat. Rain, distilled, or reverse osmosis water only, as they are quite sensitive to high nutrient levels in the soil. However, you for sure want to feed them! During the grow season, give them 1/4 to 1/5 strength maxsea 16-16-16 (you can probably use orchid fertilizers too), and feed them 2X a month, directly into the soil or water that the pots sit into. In late summer to early fall or whenever you stop seeing new growth emerge, stop feeding them.
While they can stand full sun, I think they do best in filtered sun. Mine are located in an open field that gets blasting full sun from sun up till sun set, but they're surrounded by Sarracenia, so they do get shaded a little bit.
Water-wise, I like to grow them like S. leucophylla: keep the soil hydrated at all times, but not waterlogged. They can probably grow waterlogged and can likely tolerate it, but that is one way to get disease issues, so I don't mess with waterlogging them. In situ, they grow in a wide range water levels, from super boggy to damp but never totally dry. That said, the physics of plants in the ground is very different than potted plants, so it's not the best comparison.
Temperature-wise, they're not picky: it's been like winter this whole spring and they're still growing quite strong! They probably prefer warmer temperatures and for sure they can tolerate a wide range of temperatures during the grow season so long as they are acclimated to a specific range (eg. don't expose a plant growing at 70F to 110F all of the sudden).
Around November, the leaves will completely die down to the roots, and all you'll see are these wispy roots dominating the soil, like a fully root bound Sarracenia! The roots will have little growth points on them which will eventually turn into leaves that will bust out flowers the next spring! I keep them outdoors all year round, and the tray freezes solid down to about 21F at the coldest. Below that, they probably should be protected.
If you do plant these in a bog, be sure to restrict where they can grow, otherwise they will eventually colonize the entire bog!
Anyways, some pictures of Pogonia ophioglossoides, pics taken 6/12/23:
The "leaves" (which are probably modified stems, I don't know) on my plants are sort of small, probably because they get a lot of light. I think they'd get a bit bigger if given part shade.