Showing

Dendrobium spectabile went on a trip all by itself to the Orchid Society Show last weekend in Richmond VA. It didn't win anything, but it's still fun that something of ours was at a show. We weren't able to attend the show, so we just loaned the plant to the other orchid society members for the show table.  We are planning to go to the show in Greensboro NC this coming weekend. They said spectabile is tired out and doesn't want to go to Greensboro. That's alright, it has been flowering for a while now.

This is a picture of it in the show table (on the back left corner).

Additions and Subtractions

We've had a couple of additions and subtractions that I have forgotten to mention on the blog.

Additions:

Phal hybrid of unknown color. It was really cheap at the Orchid Society auction at Christmas time so we bought it. We thought it would be fun to be able to loan out Phals to friends, family, neighbors and bring them to work etc. But then we feel stingy with the plants after getting them to flower. This phal is planted sideways in a plastic pot with bark mix. It's healthy but not liking the sideways situation. The roots that have tried to grow on the up side have died off after just being nubs from being too dry. We are going to repot it into our standard 6in clay with sphagnum phal setup.

Another Brassia Rex hybrid. was also inexpensive and looked healthy from the auction.

Dendrobium (pink) from someone at the Orchid Society that was having trouble with it. The flowers kept blasting from too little humidity they thought. They gave it to us, since we keep ours at a greenhouse in the winter. I think it just needs more frequent water, and repotting since it's planted in rocks.


Subtractions:

that new brassia got a fungus or something and we threw it out. I went to the greenhouse one day and it just looked terrible. I brought it home and treated it once with the copper spray, but it just looked so awful and we didn't want any of the other plants to get sick. Won't be buying a brassia again for a good long while if ever. They seem to be cursed for us.

Phaph St. Swithin kicked it too. I was excited because it was growing and looking good, but then one day I picked it up and the growth was flopping. The whole growth popped right off. When we dumped out the pot it, of course, had no roots. It seemed like it was really compacted inside the pot, so that is probably what went wrong. It was disappointing because it had started looking like it was really growing, and then it was dead. I'm not sure how it managed that with such bad roots. We decided not to try and rehab it because it was going to be 10 years probably before it would flower anyways. If we want one that bad, we'll buy one and pay more for a decent sized plant.

Grammatophyllum scriptum- the mini grammatophyllum also got a fungus or something and we threw it out. That was also disappointing. It was a cool little plant. Oh well I guess. We are just not in a situation to be rehabbing almost dead plants right now.

All this leaves room for buying something at the Greensboro show this weekend!! We also need to buy a lot of potting materials there. We have a lot of repotting to do. This will also be the first time we're getting around to a plant having been in the same pot for two years. Hard to believe we have only really been orchiding for that long. We also kind of have a repotting compulsion....

It's really exciting to have three things blooming in the winter- Dendrobium spectabile, Cattleya aurantiaca, and Charlie Brown.  We really really wanted to take spectabile to the Orchid Society meeting on Monday to show it off. It was cancelled though because there was maybe going to be wintry mix, which never happened. The flowers probably won't last another month, so it will have to wait until next year. It's disappointing because that is probably our best plant for the whole year and we didn't get to show it off. It's our only really big plant. Most of our plants are still small, and it will take them a few years at least to get up to impressive specimen sizes. That is the goal though!!

We need to bring a couple more things to the greenhouse, like the Dendrobium aggregatum that isn't going to flower this year after all. It's growing really well though. We had brought it home so it could get its water free rest, but it was too late.

The catasetum is growing quickly; the plant part is already 4-5 inches tall. The roots are maybe an inch long. We really need to repot it so the roots will be in the medium when they get long enough. We have been misting to keep the roots from drying out too much and dying. It's really dry in our house. We are misting a couple of times a day just in the air and the leaves and working on getting more humidifiers.

Paph St. Swithin, which is tiny is growing well. It's existing leaves are elongating, and it's making a new leaf. I know it will be like 10 years before it's big enough to flower, but I still like to see everything growing.

The Love Orchid is putting on a flowering spike. It has a ways to go yet though- at least a month I would say. I haven't been bloom boosting it like I normally would because we recently moved to a new apartment, and it's all I can do to keep them decently watered let alone anything else.

Steven got a chameleon, and a couple of the orchids are hanging out in his cage. We mist in there a lot for humidity- which the plants like and he needed some more greenery. The spathoglottis is in there, the red and yellow mini cattleya with the virus, and the Epi radicans that's mounted on the burlap stick. The epi is in there because I was ignoring it really badly because I don't like it because it's too untidy. I know that is a little nutty. It's good for the virusy cattleya too because we are trying to keep that one separated.

Charlie Brown flowers

Charlie Brown is putting on a pretty good show this year. The flowers are much darker than they were before. They are almost a maroon color throughout. The petals used to be more orangy with a maroon lip. I've heard that can happen, but I don't know what causes it. There are four flowers this year.

Dendrobium Spectabile is finally FLOWERING!!!!!

I know this blog is probably tired of hearing about the step by step of Denrobium spectabile, but the anticipation is over because it is FLOWERING! The greenhouse called us over the weekend, and we ran right over to pick it up so we can admire it. We are really really hoping the flowers will last until the orchid club meeting on Feb 10th. I think it can do it. I will give it pep talks. We have been misting it, to try and make the flowers last longer.

 And now for the pictures!!! Aren't they crazy looking?

Sickly update

Our sick babies are mostly better I think.

The red and yellow mini cattleya still has the brown under it's leaves, but it hasn't been losing any more. I think the virus busted out because it got stressed in the fall then we stressed it more by not watering it because we thought it was fungus. We put it in a window for it to get better sun and have been watering it regularly. It seems to be improving.

Sharry baby never got any worse. After several weeks at home we decided to bring it to the greenhouse. It has liked it there. The new growths have gotten big really fast. It doesn't show any sign of still having problems.

Zygopetalum is also looking fine. It's not doing anything either, but it is winter. I think the crisis is mostly past for the sick things.

A coupe of things got sick at the greenhouse. The coral colored epidendrum got brown spots all over and is turning yellow just like happened to the large growth it had. All we have left are the babies that sprouted. They're going to kick it too, and I think I'm just going to let it. It must have some sort of systemic problem. The mini grammatophyllum scriptum also got brown spots all over its leaves. We brought it home so it wouldn't infect anything else. We haven't treated it or anything. Nothing really seems to be progressing either. We are just waiting to see what happens.

Flowers!

Cattleya aurantiaca is flowering!!! I went to the greenhouse today and got this pleasant surprise! I knew it had buds, but I didn't think they would be busted out quite yet. It is really going to town this year. It has 6 flowers on the one that is already open, and 3 more buds on the next growth. I brought it home so we could admire it.

Charlie Brown is also about the flower. I brought it home too so I don't have to go back and get it next week or so when it opens. The spike is really long this time. I'm so glad this is able to flower again after having such a rough time of it last winter when we over sunned it. It looks happy as a clam.