I also forgot to mention that I spritzed it with a dilute lemon oil and water combo yesterday and it helped dry it out and kill the mold. My coworker is super into Essential oils and uses them on everything. hopefully it didn't hurt it in anyway but I didn't want to hurt her feelings and turn her down.

**UPDATE**I couldn't let it sit in that moldy mix any longer so I took it to the sink, tossed the old mix, cut off the now dead root and and extra squishy bits, and soaked it in a bowl of water dumping it out and replacing it every few minutes as the silver bugs were floating in it. Now no bugs are seen (but probably still on the plant somewhere) and I've soaked the lone root for 20 minutes and it greened up quite a bit. My question is what to do with it now? How should I care for it to help it produce more roots? I worry about repotting it more bark and having it rot again but I also know I don't want it to dry out by leaving the root exposed. What should I do?

Heres my take. Your plant is overpotted and underlit. You are overwatering. The bugs and mold you have are due to wet conditions.

Goldstar is correct. These plants grow attached to the trunks of trees. Their roots are in the air. They get rained on and dry out quickly due to wind and sunlight. They do not grow in pots.

You need to mimic their growing conditions.

You are killing your plant. If you want to give it a try, you need to learn about the plant. We can help but you need to understand the basics of orchid growing.

Please read this information on Phalaenopsis

Your plant is also underlit. The leaves are too dark. You need to put the plant in a bright window. Repot it in bark that has been soaked overnight. Put it in a small pot (your pot is too big for the plant). You want a pot just slightly larger than the plant. Small, small, small! You lost most of your roots. In a large pot the bark never dries out. It smothers the roots and they die. You need to let the mix dry out completely before watering. Do not spritz the plant!

It is spring, time for growth. Do what we recommend and your plant has a shot at survival. But it needs bright, bright light no water until dry. Those few roots need to breathe.

Jane

Ditto to what Jane said.

To be honest, with 1 short root left and phals as cheap as they are, I'd trash it and start over.

I'm guessing the white pot it sits in has no drainage holes? That could very likely account for the mold, deterioration of the root system and bugs. While orchids need humidity, they also need to dry out.

Good luck.

Thank you all for your advice, I truly appreciate it. I am not experienced in keeping houseplants and this is one of my older plants and since it was a gift from my boyfriend who never likes giving flowers its very sentimental.

In response to your statements/advice:

I'm guessing the white pot it sits in has no drainage holes? it is in a plastic orchid container suspended about an inch off of the bottom, inside of a white ceramic pot. if any excess water is in the pot after watering I dump it out. I had been watering it only when completely dry and until it was in the miracle grow mix it got watered about once a week. The MG mix seems to never dry out and it would go 2-3 weeks between watering, but now that I know the extent of the root damage I assume Jane is correct with the pot being entirely too large for the root system. I was watering in "sips" with the occasional soak only when dry, I know they can't handle constantly being in wet material. Here they mention that Phals like to be keep evenly moist and not on a wet to dry schedule, that seems to contradict Jane's advice (and my limited understanding) of how to treat them. Is that better to aim for and if so what is the best way to water them where it keeps the bark evenly moist but not soaked? The wet to dry is how I grow my citrus and I assumed it would work for the orchid as well. http://www.aosforum.org/newsletters/pages/feb10.html

You are killing your plant. If you want to give it a try, you need to learn about the plant. We can help but you need to understand the basics of orchid growing. I understand this and that is why I have asked for help, previous to this I felt like I was doing a good job, it kept putting out new leaves and roots, the mix wasn't over watered and it was growing in size. This last watering is where it all took a turn for the worse by not drying out and molding. I am happy to take any advice given and have started reading from the link you shared.

Your plant is also underlit. The leaves are too dark. You need to put the plant in a bright window. I have it currently on my desk at work about 6 feet from a floor to ceiling wall of SW facing windows. I was concerned about putting it too close as it got sunburned before but I will move it to a book case about 10 inches from the window. My coworker has 10+ Phals in her cube with no natural light and little office light (nothing directly over her) and they are all doing fantastically, I have asked for her advice on growing mine and she seems to just get lucky with hers because she practically ignores them except for watering (low light, no fertilizer, heavy watering - her bark is always wet) She is the one who suggested to keep mine wetter then I was, I didn't completely listen as it went against what had been doing well before but when it kept wetter for longer on its own I thought it wasn't as much of a problem until the mold growth happened.

Put it in a small pot (your pot is too big for the plant). You want a pot just slightly larger than the plant. Small, small, small! I am happy to repot it into a much smaller container, that was the one it came in but its root system way much larger at the time. What size do you recommend? its current one is 4 1/2 dia. The smallest I can see on amazon is 2 in is that ok? https://www.amazon.com/HIDGrowTM-Net-Pot-10-Pack/dp/B014LNOIDG/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1492704270&sr=8-7&keywords=2+inch+orchid+pot

you can tie the Phal to a stake (like I mentioned above) and suspend the phal over a bit of sphagnum in a pot or cup. I plan on this method so I can monitor the roots better, my only concern is I keep this plant at work since I have no windows that get much light at home and would I be able to keep the moss wet enough to hold the plant over for weekends? Also if I suspend it over damp moss should I also be soaking the root at any point to give it a more thorough watering or leave it alone with the damp moss? After better root growth (fingers crossed) I will move it into the better grow mix you recommended.

Thank you again for your help, I have tried many times to google about proper orchid care and either its incredibly simple "just add ice" type of instructions or very in depth scientific explanations, and I'm needing something in between. I appreciate all of your straight to the point clear instructions and hope to greatly improve my orchid keeping abilities.

For simpler advice, this is what I would do in your shoes:

Get a 3-4 inch terra cotta pot from Home Depot or similar and Better Gro orchid mix.

Soak the mix for 24 hours in warm water.

Repot your orchid into the smaller pot and top with wet sphaghnum moss. Water weekly by taking it to the sink and letting water run through the pot. Drain in the sink. Temps should be 50-90F. It will not rebloom without a 20 degree temp shift for a week or more, so if it's kept in an office, it may not rebloom easily. Some phals are more picky about this than others. Once you have more roots, you can remove the sphaghnum moss.

Good luck!

First, I want to apologize for sounding so impatient. So many people post questions about their Phals without researching even a little, about how they grow naturally.

I appreciate you are trying your best and realize there is so much information which is confusing.

We were all beginners and learned by our mistakes but kept buying more plants until we figured out what was not working for us and what worked.

In my case, even after 20+ years of growing, I bury lots of plants!

The biggest cause of root loss is overwatering and underlighting. I appreciate your co-worker is doing well with her Phal, and I wish her well. I won't even go to there as the basics of plant growing require light and with orchids...air around the roots.

I try to teach people by visualizing how the plant grows naturally. Phals grow on trees attached to the trunks and branches. Their roots evolved to survive that way. They do not grow in the ground.

There are orchids which grow in the ground but Phals are not one of them. Their roots are exposed to light, air and rain. They are not buried in a pot. It could rain for a week and their roots would not rot. Hanging on trees allows the roots to dry out quickly.

When we pot an orchid we attempt to mimic their natural growing conditions. We want their roots to get watered but dry out quickly just as they would do on a tree trunk.

Your orchid was kept too wet. The roots were not absorbing the water and the bark just stayed damp. That cuts off air flow to the roots. They smother and die.

A smaller pot has less bark. The idea is to just have some moisture near the live roots which will take up the water and allow the bark to dry. Air flow helps dry the bark.

I am a firm believer in light. Most new growers underlight their plants. When plants have the proper light, they will grow. When a plant grows, it uses moisture and fertilizer. Plants grow well with light. Light can minimize overwatering and poor care because they are 'growing.'

Underlit plants just sit. They stay alive but grow slowly and use little water or food. Roots become smothered and die because the plant is not taking up the water.

They may survive if not overwatered but will not flower.

You have a great window. Can you put the plant on a table placed 3ft from the window? Is there a shade on the window?

This is springtime. Daylight is getting longer and plants go into growth mode. If repotted in a smaller pot or with careful watering, if you increase the light levels it should initiate root growth.

Sorry this is so long, I felt bad about my impatience. You are doing a good, responsible job and I'd love to see you turn this around.

Jane

Thank you Jane, no hard feelings here. I completely understand a bit of impatience with new people posting questions about their plants. Most won't take the time to do any real fix or learn what they were doing wrong in the first place so it can seem like a waste of time to try and teach them anything. I spend all of last year going in depth on learning how to care for citrus in pots and the citrus forum was incredibly helpful to me. I did have to stick around and prove I was really wanting to learn but eventually my questions got answers and I learned a lot by reading the everyday posts there. I had always put orchids on the back burner because they seemed so intimidating to me but what I realize now after going head first into gardening this year is anyone can learn to grow anything it just takes time and information.

I have my orchid suspended over damp sphag, in a small container and I will move it closer to the window for better light. my car is in the shop right now but as soon as I get it back i'll head to the store and see if I can find some better gro mix and transition to that. I am worried about the bark retaining too much moisture again but I will put it into a 2" pot and top the bark mix with sphag and hope for the best.

Thank you all again for your advice, I plan to stick around and read others posts to learn what I can. I will post an update once the plant either improves or takes a turn for the worse.

***UPDATE***

I have been keeping my poor little orchid suspended over damp spag in a glass. It has tried to put out numerous roots over the last 1-2 weeks but they all turn black within days. It dropped its big leaf two weeks ago but it was old and discoloring, today when I took the orchid out to inspect the roots another leaf dropped. I know I should toss it but since it's tried to grow 6 new roots I feel like I cant give up on it when it's trying so hard. I haven't been able to find anywhere with enough light since the leaves aren't getting any lighter. Is there anything I can do about the black stuff (mold?) that keeps popping up on the roots? All of the black spots are root tips that were green then turned black. There is one new green root growing between the old leaf and the new that is half green half black. Should I take off the covering of the old leaf or leave it on? Is there anything I can do to treat it?

It's good to see that your phal is still hanging in there and is trying its best to recover!

Hmm...would you mind describing the exact process of how the root tip turns black? e.g. one day it looks fine then immediately dies the next day, or it slowly turns black, etc.

Are you spraying the base of the plant itself?

I'll try to provide some possible scenarios as to what's going on-

1. Mechanical damage-something has bumped against the tip/chewed off the tip/otherwise damaged it so it cannot grow

2. Low humidity-root tips begin growing, but dry out due to low humidity

3. Fungal attack-root tips begin growing but die due to a fungal attack

4. Salt damage-root tips are exposed to salt (perhaps from being watered with hard water) and dry up

Could you possibly go down the list and eliminate some (e.g. "It hasn't been touched or bumped against so it couldn't be mechanical damage")?

The leaves of the orchid don't look too wrinkly at all-that's good. If a leaf begins to yellow, do not cut it off (unless you have reason to believe that it could spread fungal or bacterial rot) and allow it to dry on its own. As for the dry leaf sheath-I would leave it alone for now and monitor that root tip carefully.

Also-some additional advice:

Sometimes it's best not to baby recovering plants too much (like picking them up all the time, etc.). I like to say that plants thrive on a little neglect. If you are doing all you can, then it's best just to set it aside for a while and leave it alone (other than looking at it every day :P) to let it do its own thing.