Not having success in the past even with moth orchids, I decided to try yet again. This time, success! New leaves, new flower stalks, and yes, cascading new flowers; better yet, no dead or dying plants. So what's the problem? Why am I worried?

Well, after my phals bloomed, I cut the stalks back and repotted. They were pretty pot-bound, so I bumped the pot size up a bit. To my surprise, though, when I went to remove the original potting medium, it was the densest, most tightly packed stuff I have ever seen! [I'm not sure what it was. Perhaps coir?] It took me at least 40 minutes per plant to carefully remove the old material without damaging the roots.

To a grower of A-----n v-----s [I don't dare utter their name in the orchid forum], I am trained to use porous and friable potting material, so I was horrified to see what the orchids were potted in. [Root rot, root rot, avoid root rot.]

A local commercial grower said not to use spagnum moss, and Web sites always say not to pack the medium too tightly, so I did the natural thing and used AAA NZ sphag, and packed the moistened material in real good, but nothing like the solid brick effect of the original potting.

But try as I might with my bony fingers and using a chopstick, I can't seem to get the sphag into all of the nooks and crannies, and I can see air spaces here and there with some roots not touching the new medium. Do I assume that if these roots are not touching moss, they get no moisture and will die?

I have been watering the orchids every two weeks, which is enough to give an AV grower ulcers, but as I said earlier, these little puppies are thriving-so far.