Question
I've had a phalenopsis for about 5 months now, and when the blooms dropped off, I trimmed back the spike since I wasn't concerned about having another round of blossoms right away.

However, since I've had it, several of the leaves (4, I think) have dropped off (there are still 3 healthy big ones left) and no new ones have grown.  A second flower spike that was growing very rapidly for the first few months has also seemed to stop growing.  The roots seem to be doing fine, and I am noticing more tips poking up through the top of the medium.  My house is relatively cool (I live in Michigan), so I don't water it very often (once every 2 weeks or so).

Is there something that I can do to encourage it to keep growing? I'm just afraid that eventually the other leaves will turn yellow and fall off without any new ones forming.  They don't turn yellow and fall off overnight--it usually takes a week or so before it falls.  The most recent one to fall off was probably about a month ago.  And since so many leaves have dropped, the bottom leaf is now well above the top of the medium and the orchid seems to be leaning a little bit.

Sorry this was so long, but do you have any suggestions?

Thanks for your help,
Morgan

Answer
Hello Morgan,

If that many leaves have fallen off your phalaenopsis, there is something bad happening.  A phal may lose one or at most two leaves during the year, so for yours to lose four in such a short time is not good.  

How have you been watering it?  From above the plant?  Late in the day or evening?  How often do you water it?  Mist or spray the leaves frequently?  Did you see some black sooty looking areas at the base of the leaves that fell off?  Is there some air movement where it is growing?  

Watering should be done in the morning so as to allow sufficient time for any water droplets to evaporate by nightfall.  The same goes for misting and spraying.  Black sooty areas at the base of leaves would indicate the presence of fungus that had grown there due to water being left overnight.  Having some light air movement around it would help dry off any water that might have splashed on the leaves during watering and misting.  Also, if it is growing where there is little or no air movement, it can take quite a while for the potting media to dry out between waterings.  Phals prefer becoming barely moist between waterings.  

How cool is your house?  Phals do not like temperatures much below 60 and really hate temps below 50.  

You might consider unpotting it to take a look at the roots within the pot.  If the roots are mostly healthy and firm, then repot it but if there are quite a few soft, mushy roots that would mean you should repot into new potting media after trimming off the dead roots.  When repotting it, position the bottom leaf to be just above the media.  Also, use a pot size that will just barely contain the roots as too large a pot would tend to cause the media to stay wet for too long, causing the roots to rot.  

Sorry for this long-winded response.  

Jim Kawasaki
San Jose, Ca.