Growing pleiones - the hard way...

[Maren]

So many wonderful ideas, I am beginning to cheer up a little, although when I went to the nursery, there was more 'disorder' and it took me 5 hours to re-pot everything. But it was less than the day before. Maybe the critter(s) are weakening.

Dave, had a quote for £850 for a night vision camera and bits. I don't think so. I saw the Swann advertised and liked it, but there is nobody who can tell me what it can do and how it works e.g. does it take pictures or video; does it work without artificial light in the dark? Lots more questions.

I keep all my little pots (7x7x8cm) in flats and today I covered 20 flats with clear plastic domes I had lying about. Trouble is, they are not tall enough for the flowers, but they offer some protection while the buds are short. Better than nothing. If I am going to lose the flowers, too bad, but I don't want to lose the growing point on a really healthy and happy pseudobulb.

Sprinkled more bait and poison today and hoping to catch something in my many traps.

Oh by the way, I put sprinkled the flour at the entrances (there are two doors)  this morning and by afternoon there were some paw prints that looked like a cat's. But I never saw it and it could not get in at night.

[ThomasB]

So the footprints were larger than these of a rat (with rats the tail is always visible as a line between the foot prints)?
Could it be a marten which might climb in through the roof as well? But this one would most likely not chew buds and flowers.
Do you happen to have racoons over there, Maren? They can make quite a mess and climb well.

[Slug Killer]

Hi Maren

Don't know how good the quality will be but yes it has a row of infra red lights at the from that should provide enough light in complete darkness for a greenhouse. They sell them in Maplins.

http://www.swann.com/s/products/view/?product=1063

If you have power in the greenhouse you could by a DVR recorder off Ebay and outside camera (I know it's inside but better to be safe). They are not hard to set up but the Outback system looks simple and runs off batteries and a card you can remove and play on your PC. It can be set for video or still pictures at intervals of your choice and has built in motion detector to start it going.

David

[KBruyninckx]

Maren,

I hope you soon find out what animal is causing this!
I could imagine a rat being able to do some damage (more than a mouse for sure), but really throwing pots to the ground and almost turning them upside down seems a bit odd?

In our greenhouse we've had mice eat pollen of Cymbidium flowers in the past and many years ago when I wanted to grow palms trees and I had 100 nice big seeds of the Chilean wine palm (Jubaea chilensis) in a bag in the greenhouse waiting to be sown... let us just say I never had to get round to it as none were left behind: rats discovered this form of prepackaged food and dragged it all off.
Ever since then we apply poisoned bait especially in wintertime but some blocks do remain throughout the year just to protect the plants.

Blackbirds can be a 'nuisance' as well in the greenhouse... especially when they learn how to fly, but of course by then we no longer have to worry about the Pleiones

The only animal which does not seem to cause damage to the plants in our greenhouse is our (almost) resident colony of wrens.
You just have to watch out when watering the plants for 'small flying bombs' that just dash off in every direction when you reach the spot where they are hiding.  

Kenneth.

[mark smyth]

While all of this is terrible it will be fascinating to find out what is doing this damage. Rats have a distinctive scent

[johnw]

Maren - I suppose a cat may have by chance wandered in. Here is a track site if it helps:

http://www.wildwoodtracking.com/mammals/index.html

There may be one for the UK.

johnw

[BryanEmery]

Oh Maren,
I am SO SORRY!
Looking at your pictures brought tears to my eyes, a number of times I have been woken up from a dead sleep with nightmares of creatures getting into the greenhouses. Your pictures brought it to life for me. I will be thinking of you over the days to come, be strong it will get better.

Well no point trying to sleep after seeing this....

[LarsB]

I don't think I've had rat in my greenhouse, but I've had them in other parts of the house and there's a nagging doubt when I look at the pictures and read about the damage. Rats don't do that much damage, turn pots over and that sort of thing. I've had birds in my greenhouse and they can uproot many plants and knock over the odd pot, but not as much as they've done in your greenhouse. I've frequently had cats enjoying the warmth of the greenhouse and although it is anoying when they sleep on a plant and flatten it completely, they have never tried to eat my orchids. The only thing I've experienced that gave a result similar to yours was when a ferret had chased a bird into the greenhouse. There was  quite a few turned over pots then, but again, nothing eaten (Exept the bird, judging from the amount of feathers all over hte place). I have red squirrels in the garden, nesting next to the greenhouse, but they don't enter the greenhouse. It is indeed strange. I certainly hope you catch or scare away the culprit very quickly.

[Darren]

 A friend once had a grey squirrel visit his alpine house and it destroyed some dionysia cushions. Would not surprise me if this were your culprit too.

[Maren]

Lots of food for thought there, thank you all for your contributions.
 
Today, there was evidence of light pilfering and disturbance of plants, but no overturned pots. Could it be that the critter dined so effectively on the generously provided pellets that it stayed away with a belly ache?

Still nothing in the many traps and no footprints in the flour. Everything is closed and locked when I'm not there, so the critter must have entered through a tunnel. I keep clearing out under the benches.
 
This is what it looked like on Friday, day 2 of the calamity. It is not something I wish to see again.

[JPB]

Maren, I just read this post and I feel very sorry for you This must be the ultimate plant-growers nightmare.. I hope you'll be able to get things right without too much of a loss.

From your pictures I notice that the culprit didn't touch the larger pots and trays. It must have been looking for something (surely food) under the pots and not the plants themselves? The little pots are easier to lift....

Good luck!

Hans

[Martin Baxendale]

Maren, just a thought but have you checked amongst your pots and in hidden corners for a toad? I once had a large toad in a lean-too glasshouse which was jumping around on small pots, knocking them all over the place until I caught it. A hungry large toad would, I think, be quite capable of overturning small pots when hunting for slugs etc. Flowers and pseudobulbs could be being damaged by the scrabbling rather than being eaten (not sure if a starving toad would try to eat pseudobulbs in desperation but it might).

[Maren]

This morning Mr Rat went to heaven. I discovered the critter lying across a few Pleione formosana and it looked quite dead. But when I tried to move it, it wriggled and I nearly jumped out of my skin. It was very lethargic, the poison must have done its work, and I helped it on its way. No need for it to suffer any more. So let's hope that that was the end of it it. It must have sneaked in when I left the doors open during the day while I was working there.

Still a bit of mouse disturbance, they like to knock over the pseudobulbs as they run across the pots. But as soon as the pleiones have some decent roots, that will no longer happen, and I shall be back to normal.

So this damsel is going to the ball after all. Having cancelled my participation in the London Orchid show, I received a call from the nice man from the RHS, saying I should come anyway and sell a few bits, no need to make a display if my flowers have been eaten. I daresay he has a bit of a job filling the big black hole where my display would have been, but it was very nice of him to offer and I'll thank him when I set up my little stall tomorrow in the RHS Lawrence Hall in London.

Thank you all for your kindness, it helped a great deal. 

[ronm]

Thats great that you are up and running again Maren. We are so very pleased you didn't give it all up.

[Graham Catlow]

Great news Maren.
Now go and enjoy yourself for a couple of days