I tried to find the actual paper, but Dr. Wang was or is at Texas A & M and has done extensive research on this topic. Last go round I tried this and it works ! You must have enough light and enough was 750 on my light meter. Commaercial growers have two tricks to preventing phals from spiking 1) heat 2) light If you are hot then you need to cool the plants to initiate. This is a reprint Diana in Houston nicely shared her notes under a thread called "Phal Insider Growers info." Arthur and others added information and had questions. The following is primarily Diana's editing of that original post. Thanks Diana! I just came from my orchid club meeting where we had a local wholesale commercial phalaenopsis grower as the speaker. It was interesting but nothing special until he and Dr. Wang, our mentor and reknown orchid researcher, started talking about what was required to make phals bloom, and have more flowers, (a specialty of Dr. Wang's). Here's the scoop: 1. A phal NOT blooming can be determined by temperature AND light. A commercial grower can KEEP PHALS FROM BLOOMING until a particular time by keeping the temperature above 82 degrees. However, a cheaper way is to shade the greenhouse with 50% shade cloth. 2. To initiate spiking, the temperature must remain consistantly below 82 degrees. A temperature of 90 degrees, even for a short time, will prevent spiking. 3. To have more flowers on a spike, from the time the spike is 2 inches, until it is 8 inches, the temperature must remain consistantly between 65 degrees and 77 degrees. Day and night difference is not involved. This commercial grower gets the phals as 4 to 6 inch bare root plants from Taiwan. He pots them in 4 inch pots and grows them on for about 6 months, at which time they go into 6 inch pots. He then keeps the benches of phals he wants to spike under plastic with an air conditioner (on 24 hours a day) at each end until the spikes are 8 inches tall (approximately 6 weeks). He then moves them out until they have 4 or 5 flowers open, then delivers them to jobbers. Believe me this works !! I spiked about 300 phals I was growing under lights one year - all seedlings -- all novelty -- I gave 290 of them away and to fund raisers for charity. Prior to that I grew only in a greenhouse but I lost not one bud in my air conditioned light room. He also did a study on why that happens -- I wish I could find the study but this little article sums it up very well

I grow in a spare bedroom also and have about 45 phals, @15 summer bloomers and the rest winter/spring or random bloomers. I open a window (day and night) in the fall (like now) and also turn my lights back from 15 to 13 hrs for a couple of months. I'll be changing the light cycle very soon. (I figure between light change, lower temp change and such, I should be covering most bases needed to bloom these plants???) I'll continue to crack a window until the night temps in the room start dropping below 60 degrees. In the fall my grow room probably averages 75+ highs and 65- lows. Also, this room seems to have about a 10-15 degree drop from day/night year round, as the lights generate a lot of heat during the day and the A/C lowers the temps at night. Lights go back to 15 hrs in late Nov. or early Dec. In fall/winter, I try to keep the summer bloomers in the warmest areas of the room, the rest are placed where they can fit. Fertilize weakly/weekly year round and switch up ferts occassionally. Flush with pure water @ every 4-6 weeks. I grow lots of other types of orchids too, (@175 total) all in the same room, so this treatment is not 'just for the phals'. Last year I had about a 90% bloom rate for my phals. As a side note: My first winter/spring phal is spiking. By first, it is the first of the season to spike and the first orchid I ever purchased (Jan '02). It's a hybrid lipstick phal ('Happy Girl') that is pretty standard, but special to me. HTH, Bob

Jane, I think you would enjoy big returns on a small investment in phals, maybe even just one new blooming size a year? In spring of '06, I bought 6 of these, three from Odom's and three from Norman's. It was a great investment in flowers-- I had flowers for several months that spring, then they re-bloomed again in spring of '07, and now setting spikes again. I lucked out into one that was out of bloom for only 1 month out of 14-- and that was because I cut off the spike. It put out a new spike one month later. Before I buy anything these days, I check out orchidwiz awards pages, to get a description of the best plants. From the CCMs, you can tell which ones put out multiple spikes, size and number of flowers. From the other awards, you can get an idea of what the flowers will be like. I noticed that Sedona's breedings have a lot of awards for the type of phal I like, (waxy/shiny reds and purples) and went to their website. They have a limited number of very special plants. I bought two of their awarded reds from Sedona this summer. They were both whopping big plants in 6" pots, and have each two spikes beginning. I know you're very busy, but when you have a chance, check out the photo pages at Bedford orchids. Url is below. Some are just so gorgeous. Here is a link that might be useful: photos at Bedford Orchids -- 10 pages like this one

At 10" an oncid has enough energy to complete the job without being in the light. As long as you keep the plant in the same position with the spike near 1 light source (window, light) the buds should remain in orientation. For phals you can usually orient them so they have enough room to grow up and past the lights. Since phals take a few months to bloom I get a single cfl and place it at the leaves in a window. The buds will climb towards the window light and the plant will remain light. Clara