On my relationship with orchids
Jun. 5th, 2012 10:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nineveh_ukMy relationship with orchids goes like this:
- I acquire an orchid, which is in bloom or about to flower;
- the orchid flowers;
- I attempt to look after the orchid, but its health steadily deteriorates;
- the orchid either dies or is rescued by my mother who nurses it back to health;
- my mother returns the once again about-to-flower orchid to me, and the cycle continues.
I don't mean to do it. I pay attention. I even have orchid fertiliser. And yet I kill them. My mother tends to them with benign neglect; I with malign care*. Take the latest victim: I attempted Mum's practice of benign neglect, with the result that it was drastically under-watered. I tried to water it a bit more, and it got too wet. It hated being on the kitchen windowsill, though my mother keeps hers on the sitting room windowsill, equally east-facing, above a radiator and in a draught. My aunt is a member of the British Orchid Council, but clearly I didn't get the genes.
But I will not give up! I bought some orchid compost, and yesterday I unpotted it, removed the roots that were now rotten, and re-potted it. It shall live on the shelf in the spare room, and I shall water ultra-sparingly (but enough!). And if by mid-August it is still looking peaky, I shall give it back to my mother's convalescent home for orchids I have ruined, until it is ready for me to abuse it once again.
I'm really much better with pets.
*I've tried benign neglect, that didn't work for me either.
- I acquire an orchid, which is in bloom or about to flower;
- the orchid flowers;
- I attempt to look after the orchid, but its health steadily deteriorates;
- the orchid either dies or is rescued by my mother who nurses it back to health;
- my mother returns the once again about-to-flower orchid to me, and the cycle continues.
I don't mean to do it. I pay attention. I even have orchid fertiliser. And yet I kill them. My mother tends to them with benign neglect; I with malign care*. Take the latest victim: I attempted Mum's practice of benign neglect, with the result that it was drastically under-watered. I tried to water it a bit more, and it got too wet. It hated being on the kitchen windowsill, though my mother keeps hers on the sitting room windowsill, equally east-facing, above a radiator and in a draught. My aunt is a member of the British Orchid Council, but clearly I didn't get the genes.
But I will not give up! I bought some orchid compost, and yesterday I unpotted it, removed the roots that were now rotten, and re-potted it. It shall live on the shelf in the spare room, and I shall water ultra-sparingly (but enough!). And if by mid-August it is still looking peaky, I shall give it back to my mother's convalescent home for orchids I have ruined, until it is ready for me to abuse it once again.
I'm really much better with pets.
*I've tried benign neglect, that didn't work for me either.
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(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-05 04:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-06 08:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-06 10:50 am (UTC)While I wasn't looking it has flowered and is attempting to come in the window and cross the road. I didn't plant it. It was here when we got here and is beating even my shear-wielding attempts at what the Dog Woman over the road called "destructive gardening" last time I was doing it.
Geraniums do well on active neglect. They just keep flowering because they think they are about to die.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-06 02:02 pm (UTC)My garden is full of geraniums...
(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-13 02:06 pm (UTC)Outside, I seem to have inherited my mother's ability to grow anything that spreads. In the front garden, the lilies of the valley, campanula, and thruppenny sedum (variety unknown - I won the originally tiny rosette for 3d on a tombola when I was about 8!) are battling it out for dominance. The Welsh poppies are joining in, occasionally abetted by the violets (both weeds, mostly, though the poppies are a pretty colour). The anemones and cyclamen that I actually WANT there have no chance.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-14 08:24 am (UTC)My garden was planted by the owner of my house prior to my landlord, who was obviously quite a plantswoman. It is full of interesting things that have been battling it out for twenty years, and which I hack crudely back just to keep in tolerable control (it is lovely, I wish it were mine, as I would do a bit more with it than I can as a tenant).
(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-06 12:38 am (UTC)I suppose I fall into your mom's benign neglect category, huh?
(no subject)
Date: 2012-06-06 08:24 am (UTC)