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I need help diagnosing what is wrong with my orchid here. Of my seven phalenopsis orchids it is the only one that looks like this but it's also the one furthest along in spiking. I didn’t notice anything when I last watered it last week. I am particularly concerned by the misshapen bud:

brown spots

misshapen bud

I’m hoping it's because we’ve been keeping the house cooler (57°F at night) to try to save energy―I thought phals were still ok at this temp though. But I’m worried it's an infection―can anyone confim?

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57 should be fine, it looks to me as though the spots are supposed to be there, and will be part of the color of the flower... If it were damage it would probably be too late to do anything anyway...

I would just preach patience in this case.

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    You are absolutely correct - this orchid was one I "adopted" and had no idea what it looked like in bloom. Turns out it has beautiful deep purple assymetrical blotches on the otherwise white blooms, and those blotches show up on the outside of the buds! I'm still not sure what's up with the bud where the lip is jutting out of the bud - that bud hasn't opened yet...
    – dcsohl
    Jan 11, 2016 at 15:19
  • That bud has now opened, and looks mostly fine - the lip is a bit yellower than other flowers and maybe a little dried-out-looking?
    – dcsohl
    Feb 1, 2016 at 20:07
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Same thing happened to me. I panicked and cut off the three largest buds because they were the ones with the brown spots. I was afraid the "spots" would spread to the other buds. I opened one of them up after I cut it off and there were indeed white petals inside the pod with deep purples spots ready to bloom. Fortunately, there are about six smaller buds left at the end of the stem that were not spotted. I know now to let them be.

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