Like all plants, leaves start young and grow up to be old, then turn yellow and die off. Its a natural part of the plant life cycle. The wrinkled leaves are probably caused because of humdity or water problems. Phals should not be allowed to dry out. They can not hold water like cattleyas and cymbidiums. You need lots of air movement around the roots, bark is a good choice. I hate moss, its up to you and your growing conditions. Dark green leaves indicate a lack of light. Phal leaves should be a bright green, not dark. You might want to up the water to every 4 days if they are drying out at the root level. Dont pack the bark real tight either. Phals also like to be pot bound, with roots flying out all over the place. Good luck.
:-)

orchiddude

Thanks for the info. I have just moved to a smaller place and I am limited to sunny spots in the house. So maybe good growing conditions is an issue right now in our winter months. I take them to our cabin in a couple of weeks where I have a sun room so that will help them. I have also noticed that some of my flowers are even smaller these past few months. So that also might be a lighting issue that needs to be corrected. As for watering, some I do water more frequent than the 7-10 days.As for the roots flying out of the pots, those seems to be good , if thats a good sign. Thanks again for the info.

Do not put the phal in the sun. Just bright light. You will burn the leaves up in the sun.

I beg to differ. Zone 3 sunshine is very, very different from Alabama sunshine. I'm sure your plants need much more light.

Kevin

Your right Kevin, zone 3 is different than zone 7.

But if you tell someone on a zone 3 thread something and a zone 5,6,7,8,9,10 person comes by and reads it, if they are new to phals, and they see someone said, "put the phal in the sun" you are going to kill a plant.

Not everbody is going to look at the zone factor and put 2 and 2 together.

I agree with Kevin, not enough light/heat. Dark green is a sign of lack of light especially in z3. I have some phals in a west window in z5 with supplimetals. They are rescue plants

Some yellowing on the bottom, yes it is a natural cycle of the plant shedding the lower leaves, depending on age. But the OP seems to have a global problem which may have been missed.

Phals are not "beginner Orchids" but many beginners start with phals. Dark green is ususally a sign of not enough light. Heat also goes hand in hand with light. I am not saying that the OP is a beginner but responding to the "what if" in the above post.

I also do not agree with NOT letting a phal dry out, especially if we are assuming that someone new to Orchids is reading the posts. Phals are prone to root rot as you can see by the numeorus "help my phal" posts. I have successfully ressurected many phals, I won't own them. Just not my thing.

I prefer to use bark and clay pots. Plastic does not dry at the bottom. Tougher to tell for a beginner when the plant needs watering. Spag simply holds too much water and for a beginner they tend to overwater when they see crunchy spag on top. For me, Plastic pots and spag is the kiss of death combination.

It sounds like the op needs more light/heat and if the leaves on multiple plants are very wrinkled and yellowing I would check the roots. It sounds like it may be root rot if it is happening to multiple plants and the blooms are small. It sounds like the plant did not have enough energy to produce bigger blooms. (water and light = energy) If it is root rot, then the op knows that watering less frequently would be in order. The OP does not say if misting is occuring. Misting is watering IMO. I don't mist

The roots flying out of the pot are called aerial roots and it is NOT a sign that ALL roots are ok. I took in 1 very sick phal that was living on 1 aerial root. It had no other roots. Check the roots and see what is going on. Then you will know for sure.

If it is root rot, the FAQ section has some great advise on how to repair root rot. Although I avoid spagum moss. I pot down and "bark and bag" instead of "spag and bag". My rescue cases have all recovered from near death. 1 has produced goregeous blooms and 1 is on the way to doing so. Another tried to spike but I cut the spike. It just wasn't ready. Good luck
Clara

"Your right Kevin, zone 3 is different than zone 7.

But if you tell someone on a zone 3 thread something and a zone 5,6,7,8,9,10 person comes by and reads it, if they are new to phals, and they see someone said, "put the phal in the sun" you are going to kill a plant.

Not everbody is going to look at the zone factor and put 2 and 2 together.

That's very true and one of the problems with giving advice on a forum with posters across the globe. I guess that's why I always look to see what zone a person is in and then make a decision if I even want to try to answer the question. At the very least I try to qualify my statement with "under my conditions". Light is definitely a tricky thing from one area of the country to another or one part of the world to another.

K

I feel i should qualify orchiddudes "leaves should be light green" mantra. It is a good starting point, but its also very important to note that many phals actually have naturally dark green leaves. I once had a Phal. Everspring King 'King Dragon', the leaves were a lovely shade of dark green, and it obviously got enough light because it bloomed very well. Any attempt to "lightening up the green" would have been futile because its not the natural growth habit of the plant. This is a perfect case of knowing the individual plant vs. catch all culture, as was highlighted in Kevins catasetum thread.

I agree with you on that terguy, I have one that has 15 blooms on it and all the leaves are dark green, I think it depends on the individual orchid. Good luck. I think it is just a matter of seeing how the orchid is doing in certain cases whether it is lighting etc. and keeping an eye on its progress, at least that is what I do.

Excuse me for trying to help.

With theflowerlover passage above, she/he has written a very beginner type help question. The questions that need to be answered are your basic cultural questions. From the passage above, I take it that this person is a newbie of sorts because of the type of questioning. I gave general information that would work for she/he. Because there was a lack of information about what type of phal, or a picture showing the plant, its common to give a general advice. Out of the 3 or 4 thousand phals that I have grown over the last 25 years, there are more light colored leaf plants than dark. Most of the time you are not going to find a dark leaf type on a Lowes or HD shelf. I am figuring that if someone bought a fancy dark leaf plant, they would also know the answers to some of the questions, maybe I am wrong.

I do know one thing, I wont make this mistake again.

Orchiddude, why get upset over trivia? I was going to write about my allsorts of Phal collection. Only 40 plants, but the leaf colours are all over the place.

If i had a collection of mostly standard type Phals. no doubt most plants would have the same leaf colour.

Never mind arthrum, I dont even know why I posted an answer in the first place.