Anguloa cliftonii

June 28, 2016, 5:58 am

≪ Previous: A Vanilla Scented Tulip Orchid

Even if it weren't scented like an ice cream sundae, this pale yellow tulip orchid with red marbled petals and gracefully curved sepals would still be one of our most striking species. But best of all is what's hidden inside.

As I unwrapped the layers of sepals and petals, the sight of the lip actually made me laugh.

All anguloas have a hinged lip to facilitate pollination, but cliftonii's lip has something special in the way of ornamentation.

The lip is a miniature bowl with flared edges, and its ornate apex arches backwards as Henry Oakeley writes in his book Lycaste, Ida and Anguloa, "like the handle of a ewer." Ewer?

That sent me on a Google search. Above is the lip rotated 180º and flipped horizontally, looking like a tiny pitcher with a handle, a ewer. How cool is that?

The apex of the lip is the source of the fragrance, which is highly attractive to at least one species of Euglossine bees. It is angled toward the column, so that the bee's weight causes it to tilt toward the anther cap and pollinarium. Upon contact the pollinarium is attached to the bee's abdomen.

Our tulip orchids are off to a slow start this summer, but I expect there will be many for you to see in the Orchid Display House in July. They are wonderful!

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Two Miniatures

July 2, 2016, 4:38 am

≫ Next: Stanhopea costaricensis

≪ Previous: Anguloa cliftonii

Two of our miniature orchids are generating a lot of excitement this week. Dyakia hendersoniana, all of five inches tall, has the kind of electric fuchsia coloring that is visible across the greenhouse.

Dyakia hendersoniana grows as an epiphyte in primary and old secondary forests from 0 to 700 meters elevation in areas of high rainfall on the island of Borneo. The column and lip are white, and the lip has an elongated spur.

Since my reference states that this is now a very rare species and endangered in the wild, I took this minute specimen to my office for pollinating. Tiny orchid flowers with spurs are (for me at least) one of the supreme challenges in orchid pollination. Removing the tiny anther cap and maneuvering the two pollinia into the stigmatic cavity without dropping them into the spur or onto my desk requires enormous patience and a steady hand. Usually, after I've dropped a few and I finally have the pollinia correctly positioned, they perversely refuse to release from the tip of my pencil. I am, as ever, amazed that insects can effortlessly accomplish this.

Pleurothallis tripterantha makes a perfect tiny specimen plant with pendant chains of honey colored flowers. It is an undemanding little plant that seems to always be in flower (perfect, in other words). We grow our plant in an intermediate temperature greenhouse in 80% shade. Pleurothallis tripterantha is widely distributed from Costa Rica through northern South America in wet montane forests at 900 to 2700 meters elevation.

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Stanhopea costaricensis

July 10, 2016, 4:29 pm

≫ Next: The Greens of Summer

≪ Previous: Two Miniatures

July is just a little early for stanhopeas here. It will be another month before the flooodgates open. In the meantime, we had a magnificent Stanhopea costaricensis in flower in the Orchid Display House last week. The fragrance was just wonderful, with a hint of vanilla.

Our Stanhopea costaricensis has deep red splashes of varying sizes on the lip and column and some fascinating leopard spots on the petals and sepals.

It's flower isn't quite as big as the really big boys- Stanhopea tigrina, embreei and platyceras, but big enough that I had to back the camera way up in order to get the entire flower and pedicel in the frame.

Seen from above, the elongated lip has a diamond shaped hypochile.

The column has prominent wings.

Stanhopea costaricensis grows as an epiphyte in Central America between 500 and 1500 meters elevation. It grow without any problems in our intermediate greenhouse (60º night minimum) in 60% shade. And it makes an impressive specimen sized (12") basket with outstandingly fragrant flowers.

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The Greens of Summer

July 12, 2016, 4:49 pm

≫ Next: Summer Orchid Fragrances

≪ Previous: Stanhopea costaricensis

Green is a richly varied corner of the floral color spectrum. In summer it is a part of the spectrum my eye rests upon with deep appreciation. Lime, kiwi and melon hues -I think of them as a cool dessert after a steady diet of overheated tropical colors. Let's take a walk through the greenhouse and savor some of the greens.

First is a real stunner. Clowesia russelliana is a frothy extravaganza of icy mint green flowers. If you look closely, you can see a touch of pink in the petals and sepals.

It produced far and away the best fragrance of the week -a wonderful mixture of vanilla, ginger and eucalyptus.

Male Catasetum pileatum flowers are a gorgeous creamy green. It's not very often that we produce female flowers (on the left) and male flowers (on the right) simultaneously on a Catasetum, so I was quick to get a capsule on this plant.

Notice the subtle chartreuse tinge on the lip of these truffle-shaped Catasetum luridum flowers.

The glossy lip of Catasetum expansum looks as though it has been dipped in egg yolk.

One of the pleasures of walking through the Orchid Display House is discovering a delightful color combination. Lycaste oculata with its kiwi green sepals and pure white petals seems to my eye to be the perfect summer pairing of colors. It's a shame that the greens are often overlooked. Be sure not to miss them on your next visit to the Fuqua Orchid Center.

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Summer Orchid Fragrances

July 17, 2016, 3:55 pm

≫ Next: Catasetum expansum x 3

≪ Previous: The Greens of Summer

It is fascinating to observe all the different ways in which visitors and staff like to experience the orchids here. Many people like to experience the flowers through the lens of their camera, lingering on visual details. Others visit each and every flower, inhaling deeply. For connoisseurs of fragrance, summer is without a doubt the best time to visit the Orchid Center. Here are a few of the best this week.

Phalaenopsis bellina is perhaps the most fragrant of the moth orchid species. "Fruit Loop orchid" is the common name suggested by Eric Christenson, the taxonomist who separated bellina from the closely related violacea on the basis of fragrance and morphological differences. Its fragrance is blend of many compounds, including geraniol, which has a rose-like scent attractive to bees; and linalool, a floral/spicy fragrance. The quantity and quality of an orchid fragrance can be dependent on the time of day, and you may notice that our bellina seedlings are almost scentless in the early morning and very fragrant later in the day.

Anguloa uniflora, one of our tulip orchid species, smells like wintergreen, an unexpected but wonderful pairing. Wintergreen is the fragrance associated with methyl salicylate, a volatile compound that is a common component in floral fragrances that attract male Euglossine bees. The composition of the fragrance of an orchid species can vary from plant to plant to a striking degree. If you take a moment to smell several of our unifloras, you will notice that one of our accessions produces an especially powerful wintergreen fragrance, the others less so.

I'm not going to talk about the slug who brazenly made his way to the top of a floral bract while I was composing this shot, except to say that he is no longer with us.

Anguloa virginalis has a sweet, but somewhat medicinal fragrance composed of 1.8-cineole, limonene, myrcene and pinene. By mid afternoon, our three plants can fill the back of the High Elevation House with an invisible fragrance plume.

Peristeria lindenii was here and gone in a flash typical of short-lived Stanhopeinae flowers, but with a complex fragrance unlike any other I that I know of -like a fruit salad over a layer of eucalyptus (cineole).

The practice of dipping your nose in every beautiful orchid flower will eventually yield a bad result. Lovely though it is, Bulbophyllum echinolabium produces the kind of stench that might make you think about alerting the Public Health Department, but only when you get really close. It reels in unsuspecting people the same way it would lure a fly, with brilliant red colors and long wafting sepals, until nose meets flower, then there are cries of outrage and indignation. Don't say I didn't warn you.

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Catasetum expansum x 3

July 31, 2016, 6:56 pm

≫ Next: Our War On Slugs

≪ Previous: Summer Orchid Fragrances

In the stranger-than-fiction world of Catasetum flowers -where male and female flowers look so different that they were once classified as different species, and male flowers fire their pollen like missiles -it is the male flowers that are the peacocks and warrior princes with bold colors, sometimes elaborately fringed, toothed or spotted. Male Catasetum expansum flowers have an especially large shield shaped lip. In the center of the lip is a cavity, like a truncated spur, with thick fleshy walls. The cavity doesn't secrete nectar like a spur, but is a source of fragrance for fragrance-collecting Euglossine bees.

This week in our back up greenhouses, we have three different color forms of male Catasetum expansum flowers. First in this regiment is a handsome olive color form with a blood red center and plenty of red war paint. Release of the pollen masses is triggered by a touch to the downward pointing bristle in the center. In the photo above, notice that the flower in the upper left corner still has its pollen payload, while the flower in the center has already fired its two pollen masses.

Our second color form has pale green petals and sepals against a rich yellow-gold lip.

The most common form in our collection is a soft mint nonpareil color, to my eye the most soothing of the three. Catasetum expansum has a surprising range of color forms for a species with a relatively small distribution -northeastern Ecuador, where it grows as an epiphyte in seasonally dry forests from sea level to 1500 meters elevation.

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Our War On Slugs

August 9, 2016, 4:37 am

≫ Next: Bullish on Stanhopeas

≪ Previous: Catasetum expansum x 3

These days, 7 am finds me iphone flashlight in hand, visiting each greenhouse, searching the orchid collection for slugs, who I then crush under foot. This summer has brought an unusual amount of slug activity in all of our greenhouses, an unexpected development in the middle of a bright dry summer. They have made their way into pots and hanging baskets, eating root tips, new shoots, young flower spikes and flowers.

One triumph in our war on slugs has been among the Bucket Orchids (Coryanthes), usually a prime favorite of slugs, bush snails, cockroaches and practically any other pest you can name. Everybody, it seems, loves a Coryanthes. But this year the Coryanthes are producing flush after flush of absolutely pristine new roots and shoots. Our secret weapon: diatomaceous earth applied to bare root plants.

Diatoms are unicellular algae with lots of silica in their cell walls. Silica is the major constituent of sand, but it is also found in living organisms. The fossilized remains of diatoms are mined from deposits in the western US, Canada and Germany. The granulated product has industrial uses in filtration systems. Diatoms can also be milled to create a talcum-like powder, called diatomaceous earth, which is abrasive, porous and hygroscopic (moisture absorbing). Diatomaceous earth kills insects and mollusks by abrasion and dehydration.

We began our campaign against slugs on our Coryanthes two years ago. The battle plan had two phases: Remove their sanctuary and then apply treatment. First, we removed all of our Coryanthes from their pots and washed away the mossy medium and the slug eggs; then we mounted the plants on wooden rafts or tree fern slabs so that their roots were exposed and there were fewer places for mollusks to hide.

We began applying diatomaceous earth to our Coryanthes at the height of the slug and bush snail season. Bush snails are tiny. Dozens can hide in the crevices between pseudobulbs. A good way to monitor slug and snail populations is to check the exterior of the raft an hour after watering. Before treatment, I found at least one slug and 10 to 50 bush snails on each wooden raft. We applied diatomaceous earth weekly throughout the spring and summer to the exposed roots, in between the pseudobulbs and to the leaves.

This summer, after renewed applications, there are 0 to 2 bush snails per plant and no sign of chewing damage to root tips or leaves from slugs or cockroaches. We plant to continue applications through the autumn.

A few tips for using diatomaceous earth for slug, snail and cockroach control:

Look for "Food Grade Diatomaceous Earth" in order to get freshwater diatoms. Avoid "Pool Grade," which is saltwater-derived.
Keep the package sealed and out of the greenhouse or any other humid environment. The powder is highly porous and once it absorbs water from the atmosphere, it loses its ability to dehydrate pests.
Wear a dust mask. Silica dust is harmful to lung tissue.
Apply diatomaceous earth once a week to the entire plant and its mount when the surfaces are dry: the new shoots, leaves, flower spikes, the slab and in between pseudobulbs. Let it sit at least overnight before you water again, since water will wash it away.
Any soft brush will work as an applicator, but I like the idea of battling an enemy with a cosmetic brush. Drugstores carry them.

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Bullish on Stanhopeas

September 9, 2016, 2:33 pm

≫ Next: Phragmipedium kovachii

≪ Previous: Our War On Slugs

Stanhopea hernandezii

For a long time I thought of Stanhopea hernandezii as a sort of junior sized version of Stanhopea tigrina, that mastodon of the stanhopeas. Both give the impression of a massive cranium and formidable tusks. But it wasn't until this summer when we flowered both species simultaneously that I was able to compare them side by side.

Stanhopea tigrina

In profile, it's easy to see that the the bottom of the hypochile is rounded like a bowl in hernandezii, but flattened in tigrina.

Stanhopea tigrina, a second color form

Stanhopea hernandezii, dorsal view

The horns are round in cross section and slender in hernandezii, but flattened and broad near the base in tigrina.

Stanhopea tigrina, dorsal view

Stanhopea hernandezii, lip and column

Notice the striking difference in the columns of the two species: hernandezii's narrow column compared with tigrina's broadly winged column.

Stanhopea tigrina, lip and column

Stanhopea hernandezii, lip

With the column removed you can see how much broader the epichile is in tigrina than in hernandezii.

Stanhopea tigrina, lip

Stanhopea hernandezii, lip in ventral view

Stanhopea tigrina, lip in ventral view

Stanhopea hernandezii, column

Stanhopea tigrina, column

Stanhopea hernandezii and tigrina are both endemic to Mexico. S. hernandezii occurs on the southwestern slopes of the Mexican plateau at about 1,600 to 2,000 meters elevation in the states of Morelos, Mexico and Michoacan. I can't find referennce to a specific pollinator for hernandezii. The largest fragrance components measured by Gerlach (in Lankesteriana 2010) are cinnamyl acetate (64%) and benzyl acetate (11%).

Stanhopea tigrina is known from the eastern slopes of the plateau at about 1200 to 1800 meters in the states of Tamaulipas, Hidalgo, Puebla and Vera Cruz. Its pollinator is Euglossa viridissima. The chocolate fragrance described so often in the literature (but which I cannot discern in our plants) derives from the combination of phenylethyl-acetate, a primary component of the fragrance, and vanilline, one of the secondary components, according to Rudolf Jenny.

Our S. hernandezii, which we received from a commercial nursery as S. ecornuta, flowered in August and probably won't be on display again until next summer. On the other hand, we have quite a few S. tigrina in our collection. The flowers only last about three days, but it's definitely worth stopping by to try to catch them when they flower in August and September. They are magnificent.

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Phragmipedium kovachii

October 21, 2016, 6:13 am

≫ Next: The Other Slipper

≪ Previous: Bullish on Stanhopeas

Phragmipedium kovachii, the most notorious orchid discovery within recent memory, is flowering now in the Tropical High Elevation House.

It's growing high on the waterfall, perched on mossy rocks among two other slipper orchids, Phragmipedium besseae and Phragmipedium schlimii. This is the first flowering for our plant, which is a laboratory produced seedling purchased from Piping Rock Orchids in 2009.

In the wild, Phragmipedium kovachii grows in cloud forests at 2,000 meters elevation near Moyobamba, Peru on limestone seepage sites. Since it first caught the attention of growers and scientists outside of Peru, P. kovachii has practically become a poster child for bad behavior within the horticultural/botanical community -the illegal poaching of a protected orchid by a private collector, followed by an astonishing display of poor judgement by the botanists who took possession of it. You can find a detailed account of the story in Craig Pittman's The Scent of Scandal (2012 University of Florida Press). Pittman is a reporter for the Tampa Bay Times who has covered the kovachii story since 2003. It's a fascinating story and it underscores the importance of following the law when self interest, science and the law conflict. I think of the kovachii story as a cautionary tale and I believe Pittman's account should be required reading for anyone who works with orchids at a botanical garden.

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The Other Slipper

November 3, 2016, 3:53 am

≫ Next: New Year's Day 2017

≪ Previous: Phragmipedium kovachii

Our magnificent Phragmipedium caudatum would have attracted far more admirers were it not for the raspberry kovachii flowering simultaneously on the waterfall. The lucky visitors who managed to tear themselves away and explore the back of the High Elevation House found this beauty overlooking the Sun Pitchers (Heliamphora) and bromeliads.

The markings on the oversized drooping sepals of Phragmipedium caudatum remind me of fenestrations, the translucent 'windows' characteristic of the pitchers of Nepenthes aristolochiodes, Sarracenia psittacina, and the flowers of Bulbophyllum grandiflorum. Fenestrations are thin parts of the leaf or flower that allow light to be seen by an insect trapped in the interior, but aren't actual exits. In carnivorous plants, the insect flies into the 'windows' in the leaves over and over until it tires and slides into the liquid below. Fenestrations in a flower direct the pollinator toward the anther and stigma, but I don't know if the markings on Phragmipedium caudatum function in this way.

Phragmipedium caudatum grows on rocky seepage slopes at 1,500 to 2,000 meters elevation from southern Mexico to Peru. Our plant is embedded in live sphagnum on a large granite rock in the High Elevation House where it receives a 75º daytime maximum temperature and a 52º nighttime minimum. This week, it has three flowers open simultaneously.

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New Year's Day 2017

January 1, 2017, 10:19 am

≫ Next: Bulbophyllum arfakianum

≪ Previous: The Other Slipper

Happy New Year, everyone!! I want to wish you all a joyful new year. May 2017 be filled with discovery and delight in all of the botanical magnificence around us.
⚘
Becky

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Bulbophyllum arfakianum

January 4, 2017, 3:31 am

≫ Next: Snow Day

≪ Previous: New Year's Day 2017

Bulbophyllum arfakianum unfurled its flowers for the first time last week, and I was felled on the instant. There isn't a single vantage point from which the flower doesn't look ravishing. Bulbophyllum arfakianum is native to West Papua, Indonesia. The specific epithet, arfakianum, references the Arfak Mountains, an outstandingly rich region of biological diversity on the Bird's Head Peninsula. Bulbophyllum arfakianum grows as an epiphyte in lowland forest at 50 to 400 meters elevation.

How many other flowers can you think of that look as fantastic from the back as the front?
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Snow Day

January 8, 2017, 6:30 pm

≫ Next: Paphiopedilum glanduliferum

≪ Previous: Bulbophyllum arfakianum

Atlanta had one of its snowless Snow Days on Friday in which schools, workplaces, and virtually the entire city closed down in order to allow everyone to rush to the grocery for bread, milk and batteries ahead of the impending Snowmageddon! (And, skeptics, we did get a little ice Friday night, so it was totally and completely justified.) So after everyone fled the Garden, I took the opportunity to take some leisurely pictures in the Orchid Display House. It was quiet and lovely in the semi-twilight.

See what you missed? Don't worry, most of these guys will still be in flower next week, plus many more. And don't forget, the Fuqua Orchid Center is one of the best places in town to spend a cold January day.
⚘

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Paphiopedilum glanduliferum

February 16, 2017, 4:01 am

≫ Next: Paphiopedilum kolopakingii

≪ Previous: Snow Day

Of the Asian slipper orchids in our collection, the species belonging to the section Coryopedilum are among the most striking. They don't have the candy and fruit bowl colors of some of the Chinese or Vietnamese slippers, like delenatii or armeniacum. Instead, these species are regal and impressively big. They are also, at least in our warm climate, the easiest to grow. The eleven Coryopedalum species come from Indonesian and Malaysian islands where they grow at low elevations.
A clutch of them are flowering this month: glanduliferum, kolopakingii and sanderianum.

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Paphiopedilum kolopakingii

February 21, 2017, 3:56 am

≫ Next: In the Orchid Display House

≪ Previous: Paphiopedilum glanduliferum

Our staff has lately been admiring this wonderful pale Paphiopedilum kolopakingii which we received in 2012 from Orchid Inn as Paphiopedilum kolopakingii var. topperi ('Jeanie' x 'Sam's Green Giant'). The typical kolopakingii has a lip that is burnished red amber.

The flowers of kolopakingii vary in size, with larger ones sometimes called variety topperi or gigantea. [But note that the Kew/MoBot Plant List doesn't recognize the varietal name topperi, and Phillip Cribb states in The Genus Paphiopedilum that he regards topperi as simply a large flowered form of kolopakingii.]

Kolopakingii makes a handsome specimen with all its flowers open simultaneously. The pale color of these flowers gives it a sort of ghostly presence in the hour before sunset in the Orchid Display House.

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In the Orchid Display House

June 21, 2017, 4:16 am

≫ Next: Pollinating Lycomormium

≪ Previous: Paphiopedilum kolopakingii

Maybe it's the color -a true pink, without any of the red violet characteristic of so many 'pink' orchids -that makes Lycomormium fiskei so striking. And the size. Lycomormiums are hefty plants. Our plants, which are relatively small divisions of three or four pseudobulbs, measure three feet in height and must weigh 10 lbs each, basket included. The pendant inflorescence makes an open sided basket pretty much required for producing flowers on a Lycomormium.

Our lycomormiums have big waxy flowers and a strong sweet fragrance like many orchids pollinated by male Euglossine bees. They resemble the closely related Peristeria -another genus with plicate leaves and smooth pseudobulbs -except for Lycomormium's immobile lip.

Lycomormium, Peristeria and Coeliopsis were for many years placed in the subtribe Stanhopeinae, but differ morphologically in having smooth ovoid pseudobulbs with 3-4 leaves, globose flowers, root hairs, a round viscidium adapted for attachment closer to the bee's head, a column foot, and the absence of a floral abscission layer allowing the flowers to fall off after they wither. Based on these morphological differences and on molecular analysis supporting the idea of two sister taxa, Whitten, Williams and Chase (2000) favor recognizing separate subtribes, Coeliopsidinae and Stanhopeinae.

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Pollinating Lycomormium

July 17, 2017, 3:39 am

≫ Next: Phalaenopsis hieroglyphica

≪ Previous: In the Orchid Display House

It's been a good month for Lycomormium here. This species has been flowering for three weeks, jostling for attention among the fiskei baskets in the Orchid Display House. Since we haven't yet produced seedlings from any of our Lycomormium species, this month presented a terrific opportunity to get some capsules on our plants.

Unfortunately, Lycomormium is incredibly difficult to pollinate using pollinia fresh from the anther cap. The yellow pollinia are like twin balloons that resist being stuffed into the narrow opening of the stigmatic cavity. Darwin described the same problem pollinating Gongora in On the Various Contrivances by Which Orchids Are Fertilized by Insects. His solution was to let the pollinia dry for five hours, with the rationale that the pollinia attached to an insect would dry and shrink as the insect foraged.

So, taking my cue from Darwin, I removed the pollinarium with its sticky disk from the anther cap using a pencil, and then slapped it onto the surface of the dorsal sepal. No worries about it coming loose. Pollinaria have emerged intact on my clothing after a trip through the washer and dryer at home. The photo above was taken after two days of drying in the greenhouse. You can see that the yellow pollinia have deflated and become concave after dehydrating. Pollination was easy after that.

In other Stanhopeinae, like Gongora maculata, the stigmatic cavity doesn't open sufficiently until the day after the pollinia are removed (Dodson AOS Bulletin Vol. 31 No.8). Changes in the size and shape of the pollinia and stigmatic opening make it unlikely that the bee removing the pollinia from an orchid will also pollinate it, and are important mechanisms in preventing self pollination.

Though we've had this accession for a while, it has remained Lycomormium sp. in our database since it has floral characteristics of both schmidtii and squalidum. A number of possible explanations exist, but it seems more work needs to be done on this genus. On the subtribal level Lycomormium, Peristeria and Coeliopsis have traditionally been placed in the Stanhopeinae, but more recently Whitten, Williams and Chase (2000) have grouped them together in the Coeliopsidinae based on molecular and morphological evidence.

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Phalaenopsis hieroglyphica

October 13, 2017, 4:36 am

≫ Next: What's New?

≪ Previous: Pollinating Lycomormium

One of my favorite Phalaenopsis is our magnificent hieroglyphica 'Orchidglade.' It's a stunner.

It's flowers are larger, the colors richer and the blooming season much longer -six months!- than our other hieroglyphicas, which flower September through November. 'Orchidglade' is a vigorous grower and quickly makes a stunning specimen-sized plant.

Phalaenopsis hieroglyphica is endemic to Luzon, Polillo, Palawan and Mindanao in the Philippines. When our plant isn't on display we grow it in our warm greenhouse. It likes the classic Phal conditions -warmth (70º-85º), shade (80%), year round moisture and high humidity (80-90%). The inflorescences are pendant, so we grow our plants in baskets.

But it's those glpyph-like markings on the petals and sepals that make the flowers so mesmerizing. And the pink Velcro lip. What a terrific plant this is! You can see it flowering now in the Orchid Display House.

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What's New?

March 8, 2018, 3:43 am

≫ Next: Hey, Who Turned My Peristeria Yellow?

≪ Previous: Phalaenopsis hieroglyphica

Hello there! It's great to see you again. I hope you all are doing well. I took a bit of time off from blogging in order to heed the siren call of some other big projects here, but it's time for some new posts! There's been no shortage of activity here -a storm of repotting, renovation, propagation, a new seedling distribution program, two major displays, DNA barcoding -all exciting stuff, and more about that soon.

One of the most exciting developments of the last few months is that we have applied for and been recognized by the American Public Gardens Association as holders of Nationally Accredited Stanhopea and Gongora collections. This involved a whirlwind of prep work -inventorying, gathering statistics, writing, updating records, last minute repotting and greenhouse clean up - leading up to the all-important site review by my esteemed colleague Nick Snakenberg from Denver Botanic Garden. It was actually huge fun, but it's still a nail biter having your collections inspected.

Well, we passed muster and our Stanhopea and Gongora are now in the club of Nationally Accredited collections belonging to the Plant Collections Network. Woo hoo! Together they are one of just three nationally accredited greenhouse collections in the United States. They join Sarracenia, Acer and Magnolia as accredited collections at ABG. You can find the other nationally accredited collections at other public gardens here. It's great to see you again. Thanks for stopping by and stay tuned for more posts!

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Hey, Who Turned My Peristeria Yellow?

March 13, 2018, 4:46 am

≫ Next: Orchid Daze 2018

≪ Previous: What's New?

This was a surprise. The sort of thing that happens in your dreams (especially if you are a plant breeder), but only rarely in real life: a novel color form in a batch of seedlings.

Last August, Ron Determann and I scooped up a handful of nearly identical, near-blooming-sized Peristeria guttata seedlings at Carter & Holmes. Peristerias other than elata are not common in the trade so I was delighted to add some fresh genetic stock to our two existing accessions of guttata. Naturally, I expected them to be the typical color form, white with red spots. Pictured above is one of the siblings which flowered in January. About two weeks ago, I noticed that one of the others had unusually light colored buds.

Apart from this surprising event, it seems like the genus Peristeria is in need of some taxonomic work. In our own collection of Peristeria, we have at least one individual whose identity is suspect, but the literature on Peristeria is pretty thin. In the mean time, I've selfed our yellow accession (with some of the future offspring earmarked for Mac Holmes). My experience selfing our peristerias cautions me that we've got maybe a 50/50 chance of a successful outcome -Peristeria capsules resulting from selfings often abort part way through their development.

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