I got some orchids for Christmas that had a lot of hard water stains on their leaves. At first I wanted to get rid of them for vanity reasons but orchid leaves need to be clean for health reasons too.
Most orchids require indirect sunlight and can become burned and damaged from too much direct sunlight. Their leaves are made to utilize all of the light they get. For this reason you want to be careful with store-bought leaf cleaners. Some store-bought cleaners will leave a layer of film on your orchid leaves. This can prevent orchids from absorbing enough light. I'm not saying that there aren't any good store-bought products, just read up on any you are looking to use.
I had this lemon juice in my fridge already, which I got from a grocery store. I just squirted lemon juice onto my cotton swabs and lightly wiped each leaf. I made sure to support each leaf as I cleaned them to prevent breaking any leaves off or damaging my plant.
This plant had a lot of hard water on it, but after gentling wiping down the leaves with a damped cotton swab they came right off. It's been months since I did this to many of my orchids and I have not noticed any ill effects.
~Happy Planting!
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