Tropicals & Tender Perennials: OK all you epi-heads, howzabout a little help???, 1 by Happenstance

Happenstance wrote:
Jeez Clare you're gonna make me sound like I should know what I'm doing!! LOL

I think I'll start posting a disclaimer with each of my posts:

I am not an expert with these plants. I am willing to tell you lots of things that have worked for me. And I have been successful in getting them to bloom!!!

So in my experience:
Some bud drop is normal. As with any plant if it dries out completely, say during hot weather while it is putting energy into making buds and then you drowned it in buckets of water because you are feeling guilty for having gone on vacation for 10 days.......buds will drop.

I have also observed that in a year when bud production seems to be on overdrive (like this year with my plants), some buds will drop as so many buds open.......it seems like there just isn't enough energy to continue opening the huge blooms and some of the more immature/smaller buds do drop. I can tell you that there were probably over 100 flowers open on my white Epis during any given day over the last couple of weeks.....and yes I lost a few buds. (very few)

My guesses:
Too little water.
Too much water.
Too cold.
Too hot.
Too little fertilizer.
Too much fertilizer.
Does that cover it all????? LOL

The only thing that doesn't cover is the deal about "DON'T MOVE YOUR EPIS while they are developing buds."
I've always moved the pots around during the bud developement and never had any adverse effects. If you look back through all the threads since the end of January when I first posted an image of this year's "baby buds" you can see that they have been moved and turned different directions a couple of times. Remember this is just my experience and may not work for you. :-)

If I had to pick one piece of advice.....so very hard for me to be brief.....I'd say the temp is important, fast draining soil is important, light levels are important, but if you don't feed them well they will not bloom.