hey guys it's danny welcome to another episode from our orchid care for beginners series today
oh i have quite the subject for you we're gonna talk about light it is not an easy subject it is
quite complicated but i'm gonna do my best to make this discussion as friendly as possible
but unlike other topics in the series it is indeed a little bit more complicated
and it's actually not one of those topics that has a rule that you need to follow and if you
follow it everything will be okay it's more of a each individual case a type of a thing but
if we always refer to what things actually do and how our orchids work everything actually makes
sense so are you providing enough light for your orchid is it too little or too much well that's
what i'm going to try to help you determine today today's video together with our entire orchid care
for beginners series is sponsored by reypotmy.com who offers you everything you could possibly need
to properly take care of your orchid from potting mixes to fertilizers accessories and much much
more if you're into bonsais african violets or succulents they do have something for you as well
so i'll be sure to link you to their website down below in the description and i will also
link you to my personal favorite products that i've already been using for years at this point
and i really really like them even before i knew about repugnant and before we start don't forget
to give this video a like it lets me know that i'm doing a good job for you a share would be great
and why not subscribe i post three times a week right so let's just start with talking about why
light is important for orchids and what it actually does because that will explain the
signs we should look out for when determining if we're giving enough light to our orchid
basically light makes photosynthesis possible through photosynthesis orchids produce their own
food which supports growth without this food which is actually sugar compounds orchids would not be
able to grow leaves roots flowers anything now the processes are a little bit more complicated so
i'll be sure to link you an article that explains photosynthesis a little bit more down below in the
description but basically when we're wondering if our orchid receives enough light we are actually
wondering if the orchid has enough food or enough energy to grow normally hence why i think it's a
much better idea to focus on this aspect when it comes to determining if your orchid is receiving
too little light and yes i know you'll find articles or other growers telling you that if your
orchid does not receive enough light it will have darker leaves and if it's receiving too much light
it's vice versa it will have two light leaves and well sally that rule only applies to about
10 percent of cases or 10 of our kids and for me as a beginner many many years ago it was very very
confusing so i will touch base with that but i will not focus on that sign because in my opinion
it just doesn't apply for the vast majority of you and furthermore it will just create confusion
so let's refer to the things that will help you put your puzzle together rather than just some
random rules that may or may not apply the first sign that will tell you you may not be providing
enough light is the fact that your orchid grows very very slow and yes generally speaking where
kids grow very slow in comparison to other plants but when they don't receive sufficient light they
will grow even slower and it makes sense if light directly determines the quantity of food
or sugars produced by the orchid it will definitely determine the growth rate as well
for example a healthy phalaenopsis can produce two three even four leaves per year depending on its
size very big phalaenopsis will not create as many leaves but mini phalaenopsis can actually create
three leaves per year easily when we are now providing enough light a phalaenopsis may create
only one leaf per year or maybe even half a leaf quotation marks what i mean is leaves don't even
get too mature within a growing season that is definitely a warning sign that you should take
into account and try to figure out what is wrong with your orchid growth rate should not be so slow
if you know that your orchid has an adequate root system and you are providing an adequate
pot an adequate medium ventilation and all of that stuff fertilizer included and still
your orchid grows much slower than you read about on the internet then maybe consider
light i know it's more of an obscure cause but it actually happens a lot because phalaenopsis
are advertised as low light growers but this doesn't mean that they don't need the light
at all so many people place these orchids in very very dark or shady locations in their home
and as a result they will have excruciatingly slow growth so even with low light orchids make sure
they do receive if not filtered sunlight then at least bright shade or artificial light which will
get you towards the end of this video don't worry so first sign slow growth it is a silent culprit
that i think you should take into account the next sign which goes absolutely hand in hand with slow
growth is fewer structures grown per year it is pretty obvious in the case of leaves if you don't
have speed you don't have enough leaves per year but it can also refer to the root system and again
it makes sense if the orchid does not have enough energy to support all of these structures which
absolutely need energy to grow then obviously their numbers will be lower as well and again
this is a more obscure let's say effect you cannot really gauge how many routes your orchid should
have especially at the beginning but again in the case of phalaenopsis it is not uncommon for
these rockets to absolutely take over the pot within a year or so you should definitely see
roots on the sides of your pot if not everywhere then definitely you should see about 50 to 60
of the space around the pot occupied by roots this applies both to many phalaenopsis as well as two
larger sized files because both of them do have pretty thick roots and they create a lot of roots
so if you've just repotted the orchid like this one is take a look back into the pot one year
from now if the situation is very similar to the beginning something is wrong the orchid
might look pretty healthy up top but if you're lacking root system i would suggest you consider
light again considering you've done everything else properly another sign would be the production
of smaller and smaller structures now this will happen very very gradually and in time
have you ever seen a phalaenopsis that arrives to you with pretty large leaves
suddenly creating smaller and smaller leaves well that can actually be a sign of too little light
although i will have to admit the vast majority of cases actually refer to the quantity of roots
to dehydration which is a much more common cause also if you've never fertilized your orchid again
that is the cause of the smaller structures but again if you've done everything right you
watered correctly your orchid does have roots you are fertilizing regularly and still your orchid
is producing tinier and tinier leaves then light quantity is the next culprit you should be looking
at again it makes sense the less energy you have the poorer looking the structures will be as well
so in the case of phalaenopsis obviously we are referring to leaves but if you have a sympodial
orchid such as an obsidium or a catelya then this can appear as smaller and smaller structures again
though light might be at the bottom of the list when you're considering culprits first look at
the root system most cases it's a dehydration issue caused by lack of roots or inadequate
watering but if you've eliminated everything then definitely look at the light quantity as well
and lastly of course no blooms or very very little blooms in my experience it is actually more common
for orchids which don't receive enough light to not bloom at all rather than having a poor
blooming typically when we don't fertilize enough or when the orchid does not receive
enough hydration but it is receiving enough light it will actually put on flowers but the show will
not be great when it comes to too little light actually orchids just refuse to bloom and some
orchids are very adamant about it vandal orchids typically will not bloom if they don't receive
enough light because they are highlight or kids but in my experience phalaenopsis where kids will
refuse to bloom if they don't receive enough light as well and i actually did a test on purpose i
grew some phalaenopsis in very very low light and even though they looked pretty good none of them
actually bloomed that season even with the drop in temperature as you know i grow all of my orchids
in the same room and they receive pretty much the same conditions everybody who received enough
light bloomed beautifully these guys did not and the only parameter that i changed was light
so i can say a hundred percent that light quantity affects blooming and specifically if the orchid
will bloom or not so again through the process of elimination if you know you did provide adequate
care and culture for your particular orchid and still it does not want to bloom definitely check
the light for some species of war kids it is the determining factor when it comes to blooming
while for others it might be a secondary factor but definitely not one you should overlook
now before we start talking about too much light let's address a little bit the situation
of leaf coloration depending on light yes in some cases the leaves will actually be
a little bit darker if they receive too little light but actually some more kids will respond
in the same way if they're receiving too much light because they will try to produce
a pigment which protects them from light and this pigment is called anthocyanin and depending on the
orchid it can look slightly purple or even red and i do have quite a few examples to show you
so if we have a pretty varied collection and i'm not saying a lot of different orchids maybe a lot
of phalaenopsis because they can be different between them as well so if we do have quite a
few orchids we might actually get mixed signals some of them might actually respond with lighter
leaves instead of dark leaves when it comes to the quantity of light while others grown in the
same conditions might respond with dark leaves so you're going to get a bunch of very mixed signals
i would definitely not take that rule into account or just that rule and rather think about the big
picture so now let's talk about signs of too much light because here is where leaf coloration
comes more into play if an orchid is receiving too much light in many many many cases it will respond
with a coloration change and in most cases you will see the appearance of a reddish or purple hue
on the leaves now this is an example that i actually had recently the circuit has been
exposed before me purchasing it to very very very high amounts of light
and as you can see in the footage on the screen it was almost purple and now receiving adequate light
you can see the coloration completely changed to a rather darker green as i was saying the reddish
pigment is called anthocyanin and i will link you to an article which talks more about it down below
basically this pigment amongst other things has a role in protecting leaves from intense light
so obviously when orchids experience intense amounts of light they will try to protect
their leaves so that they don't get burned we're gonna get to that don't worry however not all
orchids will respond in the same way and here i have an example of two phalaenopsis or kids
but i think it's really obvious to see that the coloration on their leaves is really not similar
at all in the case of this orchid which is the phalaenopsis bolina no matter how intense the
light you will never see purple leaves it is not prone to produce high amounts of anthocyanin it
only produces a little bit for the flower but when it comes to the leaves it just doesn't do that
this circuit on the other hand in very intense light will respond with paler leaves they're
not going to be much much paler than what you see here but they won't be this vibrant green so you
can see how that rule can be very very misleading because if you have these two orchids in the same
amount of light let's say intense light you might notice that one appears to darken up while the
other appears to lighten up so in this case it is just about knowing what orchid you have and all
you have to do is google it if you're not going to find written the way it behaves in intense light
then just look at the pictures look and see how the vast majority of them look like just gauge the
coloration of the leaf that you see there to the one that you have at home and try to figure out
if it is the type of orchid which will get red or the type of orchid which will lighten up
in intense light what you want to have is a sort of a medium type of green and obviously if your
orchid is just growing like no one's business and it's blooming there's no reason for you to wonder
if you're providing enough light but just so you know orchids do respond with some coloration
change on their leaves but it just might differ wildly depending on the variety or species
next sign which indicates too much light is sunburn and i'm going to keep the sore kid because
it actually has sunburn so you remember the footage that i showed you earlier
where this orchid was completely red well the most red parts actually turned out to be
burnt spots each orchid will respond a little bit differently this particular one
got super super red before it got burned but some orchids will just go directly to burns
now this is a bit of an indirect sign because the burns are created by the temperature of the
leaf the tissue gets so overheated that it just collapses it dies off and typically overheating
happens in intense light and what you have to do is try to shelter the orchid from direct sunshine
you can use sheer curtains or you can just change the location of your orchid to a shadier location
orchids still need to photosynthesize they need light just not so intense that it actually
burns them it's easy to determine if your orchid will get burned throughout the day
try to touch the leaves from time to time and see if they get hot if they're cool or just slightly
slightly warm that's typically okay what you don't want to feel is heat proper heat so best
thing to do is not to let the leaves get to that temperature by providing a little bit of shade
mind you just because the foliage of your orchid is red doesn't actually mean you should reduce the
light quantity for example cat layers which are highlight orchids they are very prone to having
either purple freckles either a reddish tinge to their leaves that is not a sign you're providing
too much light but rather adequate light and again it has to do with just researching what
type of mercury you have some orchids are highlight orchids and they will actually
appreciate the higher intensity and they won't get burned as easily as others so the purple pigment
is definitely not bad but you have to put it in the context of your orchid and of your environment
now let's talk a little bit about artificial light which is absolutely great for orchids in case
we don't have any space that receives adequate light for them most door kits actually respond
super super well to artificial light in fact at the moment most of my orchids are grown under
artificial light because i just don't have enough well-written spaces in my grow room so adding some
artificial light can be a great booster for your orchid but the topic of artificial light is quite
bushy and i would prefer to dedicate a separate video to it in which i will talk more about what
types of lights to choose how to position your orchids under the lights and some best practices
that i myself have discovered along the years basically the signs of too little light and too
much light apply with artificial light as well but with artificial light indeed there is less
of a chance for you to burn your orchid especially with the brand new lights available on the market
which are leds these lights don't tend to become very very hot and unless the leaves are directly
touching the bulbs it is highly unlikely for you to have actual burns on the leaves if there is a
little bit of a distance between the orchid and the light everything should be fine but indeed
be on the lookout for signs of too much or too little light and of course stay tuned for another
episode for beginners regarding artificial light since recently repot me introduced their very own
grow lights and that's great timing because as i told you a few months ago i do intend to switch
all of the lights in my grow room to actual grow lights since i do believe there is a difference
and that difference is worth it for now though we're just going to stick to natural light or
basic artificial light alrighty guys so that is about it on light did i tell you it's a pretty
bushy subject i just hope that i gave you some ideas at least to research and learn more about
if you didn't know about these terms i'll be sure to include as much information as possible down
below in the description as always feel free to go and research on your own bottom line light
is very very important for orchids the best source of light is of course natural light but not all of
us have a good exposure we don't all have very very bright houses well orchids generally grow
tremendously well under artificial light and generally speaking they don't do well in very
very dark places so hopefully now you know what you're looking for and when it comes to artificial
light on my channel you're gonna see a lot more videos on the subject and more future videos as
i am kind of switching from kitchen lights that i've been using for the past four years
to more advanced type of light so stay tuned for that but for today that's about it hope
you guys enjoyed this subject and you got to know your orchid just a little bit better thank
you repot me for sponsoring yet another video and thank you guys for offering me your time
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you