Your phal: I have saved several of these "scraps" as I call them. No intent to be derogatory, just descriptive of what's there-- no roots and two tiny leaves. Let's be nice and call them "remnants". I have also lost many more than I saved. So the probabilities are against you, but it's possible to save them. While Clara is right that it *can* be a long time before they bloom, it does depend on the vigor of the original. I had scraps of Baldan's Kaleidoscope and Little Emperior bloom the year after I brought them back from scrap-hood to normalcy. Just 3-4 flowers, but enough to warm the heart and make a nice show. It's now two years after remnant-hood and they have a 20-24" leaf span. You have to get fresh medium. Just buy a small bag of sphag. The reason for fresh medium is that the old stuff has the bacteria that originally rotted the roots in it, plus who knows how many months/years of accumulated fertilizer salts, plus is likely to be broken down. You wouldn't even put a healthy plant in that, much less a tiny remnant. Phals actually like to be repotted, and you get a 3-month or so growth spurt after giving them fresh medium. This is especially true of tinies, that don't have resources to fight against contaminated medium. Such a tiny plant belongs in about a 2" pot, clay preferably. If you can afford a small bottle of Dyna Grow KLN (it's a rooting hormone), give it a 20" float in the KLN dilute solution, and then put the KLN in your watering water for the next months or so. Loosely cover the top of the pot and leaves with a gallon size baggie, or provide good humidity some other way. DON'T MIST! Not unless you want to add crown rot to the tiny scrap's problems. In a tiny clay pot, keep the sphag barely moist. That means *watering*. If you are worried about getting it too wet, use a teaspoon or medicine dropper. In my own experience, for a plant with no roots, they often establish faster if I cut the big leaves in half. So I would cut the big yellowing leaf in half. This is what you would do with a rootless cutting of any plant, and it works with orchids as well. It allows the plant to conserve moisture because there's less transpiration surface. The leaf beginning to yellow is a sign that the tiny scrap knows it can't support it. Letting it concentrate on growing roots and needing to support only the tiny new leaves gives it a better chance. As you see, the scrap will cost you more than $1 in the end. But it's very exciting to succeed with one, and very good when it finally blooms.

Hi Svava, it's good to see you over here on Garden Web! Look for me on the Decorating Forum, too. I can imagine how badly your poor little dog must have felt during the time it took to build your new home. Poor thing! I'll keep that Royal Canin food in mind, if mine doesn't work out. Your allergy tests showed many allergies with your little dog. If Ronin's problem doesn't clear up, I think I'd like to have him tested, too. Thanks for that info! Hope your mother is enjoying life back in Iceland after living in Florida all those years. Speaking of dog foods, my neighbor called this morning to ask about my new dobie. She has two rescue dobies herself, a Blue and a Fawn. She told me that both have very bad food allergies and she suggested that, instead of putting Ronin on Eagle Pack's Duck & Oatmeal, I should try her dog's food, Taste of the Wild in the salmon variety, which her online dobie group highly recommended. Apparently, many dobies are allergic to grains and/or chicken (who would have thought?!?). This food has no chicken and no grains in it and is recommended for dogs with allergies and skin problems. She gave me several sample packs and I'm going to start easing him into it this evening. Both her dogs had severe skin issues with lesions and itching when she got them (I had no idea!) and now, after switching them to the Taste of the Wild/Salmon . . . and going off all grains and chicken, they have no skin issues at all anymore. Of course, she now reads labels like a hawk to keep them that way! Jean, my neighbor told me that there's a great Doberman forum over on Yahoo, although it's mainly for owners of Blues and Fawns, as they have the most allergy/skin problems, she says. Ronin is our third dobie and is a Black. The other two were Reds. The first, Mikaela, had no problems, except toward the end with her heart. Our second, Turk, had nightmarish eating problems, but more with eating EVERYTHING he could force down his throat, which caused over thirty partial and full intestinal obstructions and resulted in two major surgeries and many hospitalizations. He died from #37 (I believe) just before Thanksgiving at age four. If I didn't love dobies so much, I'd have given up on the breed after all I went through with Turk . . . and missed out on our sweet boy, Ronin. I do love Dobies! Again, thank you all for the information and experiences. I'm so glad I found this forum! Lynn

I actually don't mind the leaves, I find daffodil leaves FAR more offensive than colchicums. But yes, it's best (imo) to buy from a specialist and remember that they do multiply at a pretty good pace, so you don't have to buy a hundred if you want a hundred, three years from now, your fifteen will probably be a hundred, if you treat them well. Some varieties multiply faster than others, of course. I'd recommend (heartily) Odyssey Bulb (which just opened for this years orders...I think last week)...they have the largest compliment of colchs that I'm aware of. Don't wait too long, they'll be gone (I speak from experience)..and it's best to plant them before tulips and crocus are available locally. Then you get blooms this year for sure.

Nice example but actually there are much bigger ones around. I prefer to keep house plants indoors all of the time, apart from them having to cope with sudden changes in light exposure, humidity and temperature when they are moved from one environment to the other the Great Outdoors is full of bugs and slugs. As indoor plants Schlumbergera need a comparatively coarse, cactus style (yet high organic content) potting mix, bright yet indirect light, moderate watering and humidity plus fertilization (per label directions) with products packaged for use on flowering house plants during summer, with a dry period right after flowering. I find the Thanksgiving types to be very forgiving but the Christmas cactus type like you have may need to be protected from nighttime illumination during the pre Christmas budding period to flower well - or flower on schedule, anyway (a friend has one in bloom right now). Also these are prone to dropping of flower buds if allowed to become too dry after they have been set. The wild parental species grow on trees or rocks in tropical rain forest of SE Brazil, you need to give your plant less light and more humidity than a desert cactus would need. Growing as epiphytes puts them up out of the gloom of the forest floor, but still not where they are likely to be hit by hours of direct sun - in combination with low humidity, at any rate.