Hi All, I have a question.
I have this huge orchid. My feeble brain tells me that I remember it as a Stanhopea. Maybe you can look at it and tell me if I am recalling correctly. It gets hugely long flower spikes and the flowers are purple.
It has been in the largest commercially made wood basket for years and that basket has just had it, it desperately needs a new home. I have been having some extensive wood repair work done on my house, and my carpenter gave me (for free) some cedar slats that look like they would make perfect trellis and maybe a big basket. My plan is to just put this plant into the new basket, making the bottom slats as wide as possible, because the root system on this plant is absolutely huge. It takes 2 photos to get this plant and the roots in. It hangs about 6-7 feet off the ground, over my greenhouse stream, and the roots actually are growing into the stream so it gets some continuous water. I just mist it heavily up top. I don't want to disturb it over much. Does anyone have any other suggestion on a repot job besides making the basket? Is cedar OK to use? Is there an easier way LOL?

Those slender growths in the 1. picture? I don't think that is a Stanhopea. ( Stanhopeas make tight clumps of pseudobulbs)
Now looking at those awesome roots, I would just find a way to carefully place a chain around the whole thing, without trying to cram it into something else and break those roots. I have used double plant hangers, place them around the main plant and connect them wires, ( mainly underneath) so they are secure. I like to grow my Schom superbiens alba that way, which are happy with their roots hanging down also.

Ursula you are correct I misspoke. I think this is a Schomburkia. Hopefully when I get up on a ladder to try and corral it I will find the tag. These roots are so wild. The only other plant I have ever had with roots this wild was a huge yellow no-name Mokara that I bought in the FL Keys a long time ago. Your idea is a great one... I have some galvanized wire baskets I think I could cut the bottom out, cage it and work wiring underneath to hold it

Use the cedar slat as a mount. Just make absolutely sure that the cedar has not been treated with any chemical whatsoever.
I have heard of several disasters with treated cedar killing orchids! You do not want to go down that road.

Thanks Bill, I can ask my carpenter. I will be SO GLAD to get all these house repairs behind me. It seems like its been dragging on forever. If I can't use them for baskets, I will make teepees with them and cover the outside with coir fiber matting and let aroids climb all over them

Ursula and Bill this is the plant that is in that basket. Do either of you or any one else recognize it?

Yes, that is Laelia superbiens or Schomburgkia superbiens or Myrmecophyllia superbiens, take your pick.
There is some range in color to the species but it is pretty!
I had one in Florida, originally from 1983 in NY but rarely bloomed. It like Florida better and bloomed maybe 5 out of 9 years. It would have been 6 but thrips got it one year.
On Long Island it maybe bloomed 3 times in 25 years. It was all a matter of SUN! ☀️

Thanks you so much! I will make a tag. This is a favorite orchid of mine, the spikes on this baby get about 3 feet long then all these flowers just pop out. It has bloomed for me most years. I bought this from Tropiflora in Sarasota years and years ago, maybe 2007/2008 at one of the Fairchild Gardens annual sales. We were going down to Fairchild and to Excelsa Gardens in Loxahatchee on a Heliconia/plant buying spree and Tropiflora was at Fairchild with bromeliads and orchids and whatnot. I have enjoyed this purchase a lot over the years

Hmm, is this the reason my L. superbiens was always described as "different"? The colors are almost reversed.

Well it is not really reversed colors Ursula, I have seen a few a shade of paler lavender but I have seen a few darker.
But yours seem to have larger flowers then typical but I can't say for certain!

Thanks Bill!

WOW Ursula BEAUTIFUL!! I am going to get on a ladder tomorrow and see if I can dig a tag out of the basket. There may not be one....squirrels are at work again already....I found a small clay pot that I am propagating a Philodendron in with half the soil dug out today and a hickory nut left in its place.....

I usually have Chipmunks digging in some pots during the Summer outside. They did a number this year on my Spiranthes! I took those up on the deck to have them recover and left a pot with some soil for them to play. They did - the rest of the Summer!!

I have a mama squirrel that has lived in the greenhouse in winter for several seasons. At least I think it is the same mama, it could be her daughter or granddaughter LOL. The original mama chewed a hole just big enough to squeeze her squirrley body through in the polycarb glazing by the greenhouse vent, and she makes a winter nest every year in the same place, up in a piece of driftwood mounted over the door. She has made free with my plant tags for years, and buried stuff in my pots and baskets. She does;t eat anything, but she has dug plants out of a pot, thrown them on the ground and used the pot to plant nuts in. Its maddening. I can't get mad though, she is just looking for a warm place to have her children. I tolerate her. But I think that the big black racer snake that lives in the greenhouse may actually eat some of her progeny.

Everything in balance....

Gina, a bit late to your thread here, but I do recall seeing some bigger cedar slat baskets at Tropiflora last time I was there, if you might need one in future. Maybe 14in. across or more as I recall.

But I think the wiring, or chain suspension system will work great for that orchid, and not disturbing it too much is a very good idea. It's a beauty.

Thanks guys! So I was out in the Greenhouse today washing the algae off the walls after I sprayed Physan yesterday and let it sit overnight....PESKY SQUIRREL has made itself known yet again.
We have our first real cold snap of the season right now, the tail end of that bad storm causing snow and ice a little farther north. Its in the 60's at the moment, tonight we may see 38-39F. So I decided to do my test fire up of my heater. Guess what? NO HEAT. Would NOT come on. Had my go-to heater fix guy swing by and check the propane tank connections and make sure the heater was getting fuel (it was) it just was not coming on. He called his cousin who works with him, an electrician, who came right over and we jointly found while tracing down the wiring leading from the thermostat control to the heater....the wire that supplies its power was chewed through and a segment about a foot long MISSING. It was a few minutes to splice in a new bigger better wire and Shazzoom Bif Bang Bam we have HEAT. THANKS BE TO THE SUPREME BEING. I need to find some way to discourage this squirrel.

Sorry, but I would have that Squirrel Mama and her whole brood packing their suit cases. I use a Havahart trap, it doesn't hurt them, just feeds them some delicious peanut butter with your help and off they go to a local park. I would bet you have a whole clan living in your super comfy place.

Probably! I have one of those traps, but the thing is that squirrels here are territorial. If I were to relocate them outside this area, the squirrels they 'joined' would kill them

I think that is a myth, propagated by those very same Squirrels, to make you feel guilty!! When you are not looking they are writing books on that subject, so people don't throw them outside on their little butts.
For years we have been relocating Squirrels, always adding subsequent clan members to the same location. I am not giving this another thought. I tell them " stay out of my stuff and I leave you in peace." Works for me. Heh, they are even getting a delicious snack along with the gentle kick out the door. 🥜🍪