How to Disinfect Before Repotting Orchids

Disinfecting Scissors or Pruners

• 1

  Wash your scissors or pruners with soap and hot water, being careful to protect your hands from the sharp edges. Rinse well and dry the tool with a paper towel, then disinfect the blades of your tool.

• 2

  Sterilize your scissors or pruners with heat by holding the blades in the flame of a gas stove or alcohol lamp for several seconds. Protect your hands with heavy oven mitts. Allow the blades to cool, then place the scissors or pruners on a clean paper towel until you're ready to trim the orchid. Don't use this method to sterilize blades that have special coatings because the heat from the flame could damage the coatings.

• 3

  Dip the clean pruners or scissors into a trisodium phosphate solution to sterilize them if you prefer not to use an open flame. Using a container deep enough to cover the blades entirely, stir TSP into warm water until the solution reaches the saturation point and no more TSP will dissolve. Dip the blades into the solution, then place the tool on a clean paper towel.

• 4

  Use rubbing alcohol instead of a TSP solution to disinfect the blades, if desired. Wipe the blades with a paper towel or cotton ball soaked in rubbing alcohol, then rinse the blades in clean water. Place the scissors or pruners on a paper towel.

• 5

  Use a bleach solution to disinfect your scissors or pruners after the initial wash. Mix one part household chlorine bleach in nine parts water in a clean container. Dip the blades into the bleach solution before using.

Disinfecting Used Pots

• 6

  Brush away all loose dirt, both inside and outside the pot.

• 7

  Wash the pot with soap and hot water. Scrub off any mold or fertilizer salts that have accumulated on the surfaces of the pot. Rinse the pot in clean water.

• 8

  Prepare a disinfecting solution by mixing one part household chlorine bleach in nine parts water. Use a clean container that is large enough to hold enough solution to completely immerse the pot.

• 9

  Submerge the washed pot into the bleach solution. Soak plastic pots for 10 minutes and clay pots for 30 minutes. You might need to place a heavy object on top of a plastic pot to keep it submerged.

• 10

  Remove the pot from the bleach solution and rinse thoroughly with clean water. Dry plastic pots with clean paper towels. Allow clay pots to air-dry for two or three days before use.