Tips from United Malaysian Orchid

My friend, Chooi, brought me to visit United Malaysian Orchid nursery in Rawang recently. For those who grows orchids, you may be familiar with this nursery. United Malaysian Orchid nursery was once located at the junction of Jalan Glenmarie & Jalan Subang. A few years ago it moved to its new location in Rawang.

As this nursery was close to where I live, i.e. UEP Subang Jaya, I used to hang out at the nursery on weekends where I pick up a few tips from one of its workers, Ah Meng, and watching them worked with their orchids. He is very popular with orchid growers as he patiently teach us how to upkeep our orchids. He also recommended his special powder fertilizer for orchids. This fertilizer is diluted in water and when sprayed daily on your orchids, you will be assured to get multiple blooms regularly. That's how I used to take care of my orchids in the past.

I have not seen Ah Meng for several years after the nursery moved. Glad to be re-acquainted with him again. In fact, I brought Chooi to its old site in Glenmarie several years ago, and found out that the nursery has moved. I only learnt that United Malaysian Orchid nursery has moved to Rawang when I stumbled upon their booth at last year's Floria Fest in Putrajaya.

From my trip to this nursery, I have found some interesting gardening tools and tips to share here. The first one would be this home-made multiple pots holder.

It is made by stucking a tree trunk into a pot and filled the pot with cement in order to support the trunk. Then nailed several pots onto the tree trunk. Voila! You have a beautiful multiple pot holder! How innovative!

See how beautiful the pot holder looks when pots of orchids are placed on it. To ensure you have a lot of mobility & flexibility with this multiple pot holder, do not grow your plant directly into those pots that are nailed into the tree trunk. Instead grow your pots in a separate pot and place the pot onto pots in the holder (refer to photo below). As such, you have the flexibility to change and rotate the plants placed on this holder.

The above home-made multiple pots holder is very cost-efficient to make. I have seen a multi-tiered pot for sale during the Putrajaya Floria Fest 2010. It is made of plastic and have 3 tiers.

The price for the 2 varieties of multi-tiered pots can be quite damaging to our pockets.

So, if you are thinking of saving some money, why not take out your DIY tools and make the innovative multiple pot holders from United Malaysian Orchids.

Another interesting thing that I saw at this nursery is the usage of hair grip/clip to hold an orchid stalk to a stake. Of course we can always use a wire to do this, however with a hair grip (as seen in the photo below), one can easily re-adjust or remove it.

Ah Meng also showed us a new product that his nursery is selling. It is a dual nozzle spray that can be used on the mouth of a 1-liter plastic drink bottle. This is another way of recycling the mineral water or soft drinks plastic bottle.

Ah Meng demonstrated to us how this dual nozzle spray worked. The dual nozzle produces mist in a wider radius that enable the water to cover more plants with each spray. He claimed that this spray is more durable and lasting. It is very suitable for spraying liquid fertilizer that orchid growers commonly used.

Both Chooi and I had a good time at the nursery. We learnt a few new things and glad to meet up with Ah Meng again.

In case any of you are keen to check out this nursery, the contact details and map to United Malaysian Orchid are enclosed below. Frankly, I have doubts about driving there myself as I cannot recall the route we took. Anyway, what's life without some adventure? Try to hunt for this nursery if you can. Your journey will be a worthwhile one!