AboutOrchids

The upcoming winter solstice marks the shortest day of the year, but on the California coast we’re lucky to be able to garden year-round. Despite the pre-winter chill, my friend Kim has lots in bloom in her garden. She lives a few blocks from us near Dolores Park, and she’s an orchid nut like me! Her beautiful Maxillaria picta made a great display on the day we visited.

On the left, bromeliad flowers look like blue ribbons. In the middle, a little black bug tempts fate on the edge of a carnivorous pitcher plant. On the right, a tiny purple flower shows beauty on a miniature scale.

Hens-and-chicks sit among fallen ginkgo leaves, providing some autumn color on a San Francisco street. Back in our garden, the hot pink flowers of a Christmas cactus brighten up the short days. In the wild, Christmas cactus grow alongside orchids as air plants in tropical rainforests.

Related to Miltonia, Oncidium, and Odontoglossum, this charming mini species is an easy orchid. Cochlioda vulcanica is frequently used in hybridization, cross-bred with orchid relatives to pass on both its hardiness and its beauty.

It lives in tropical cloud forests at high elevations in the Andes, where it is pollinated by hummingbirds. The side view shows the long, narrow tube that perfectly accommodates their long, thin beaks.

This orchid needs cool temperatures year-round, high humidity, and strong air movement. They prefer to be potted in small pots. Dave’s macro lens shows incredible details. The dark area between the yellow spots is the hole where the hummingbird inserts its beak. In our garden, however, I think the hummingbirds prefer the Epidendrums.

As we move through the last few days of autumn, in the Northern Hemisphere at least, don’t panic if your orchid drops some leaves or looks a little peaked. With less light and cooler days, many orchids are resting in their dormant periods. If your plant is otherwise healthy, and a few leaves drop, it’s probably your orchid settling into dormancy. Older leaves, or ones that are lower on the plant, may drop as part of this seasonal cycle. Of course if your orchid is dropping all its leaves, turning black, or turning to mush, you have a problem. Your first reaction may be to water more, but this will only exacerbate the problem. Overwatering at this time of year can cause orchids to rot and die. Instead let the plant and its roots dry thoroughly before watering again.

For myself, as someone who tends to overwater, I have a trick to limit the damage I can do. Instead of a watering can, I  do my daily plant check with a a spray mister in hand. That satisfies my urge to tend to my plants, and reduces the chances that I’ll overwater them.

Regular readers may notice a penchant for the unusual in my orchid collection. So this Trigonidium egertonianum, with a flower that looks like it could be the face of a crab, should come as no surprise. It’s another example of the incredible diversity within the orchid family.

This orchid is native to a wide area of Latin America, from Mexico through Central America, Colombia, and Ecuador. It prefers to be grown in intermediate temperatures, with regular water during spring and summer, and bright light. The name of the Trigonidium genus comes from the Greek word trigonos, or three-cornered, describing the flower shape.

Orchids make wonderful green holiday gifts, since they cost about the same as cut flowers, but can last much longer. Phalaenopsis, Paphiopedilum, and Dendrobium orchids can often hold their flowers for weeks or even months. Take advantage of these orchid shows to add some tropical flowers to your December holidays.

Apropos to the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday here in the USA, the back garden has been in abundant bloom, and there’s beauty all around to inspire gratitude. These pictures are from the past couple weeks, when we were having some unusually warm November weather. This female Anna’s Hummingbird stopped long enough at the feeder for a picture. On the right, a honeybee makes a visit to our lemon tree.

On the left, one of the last Plumeria flowers from my potted tree still has its wonderful scent. It’s produced continuous flowers since the spring, but now the plant is starting to go into winter hibernation. On the right, these orange Epidendrum flowers just opened in October.

This enormous White Bird of Paradise (scientific name Strelitzia nicolai) is in the banana family, and native to South Africa. What was once a 4 feet tall (1.2 m) houseplant in a pot grew into a 2-story tree in the ground, producing massive new blue and white flowers every few months. Those leaves grow as large as 7 feet (2.1 m.)

Cymbidiums are popular orchids, and here on the California coast, Cymbidium blooming season has started. This yellow one, possibly Cymbidium Golden Elf ‘Sundust,’ is a hybrid of Cymbidium ensifolium, which has traditionally been grown in China, Korea, and Japan for centuries.

To grow these beauties with their sweet, richly scented flowers, you need to provide an environment where the nighttime temperature drops 15-20 F (8-11 C) every night. Without these nightly temperature drops, these Cymbidiums won’t form flower spikes. Otherwise, these are easy to grow with bright light, regular water, and regular fertilizer.

Even when not in bloom, Cymbidiums are beautiful plants, with long, graceful, arching leaves. Although my variety has solid green leaves, some Chinese Cymbidiums have variegated leaves, with stripes or spots of color.

What would you say if I told you it’s possible to take a trip through the rainforests of the world without a single can of bug spray? You can with Rainforestby Ben Morgan and photographer Thomas Marent.

Marent spent 16 years traveling the world, taking pictures in rainforests on 5 continents. This gorgeous coffee-table book puts you in the midst of plants, animals, insects, and of course orchids from rainforests all over the world. Marent’s photographs capture the beauty of typical rainforest animals, like monkeys, birds, and snakes, but also many small creatures that could be easily overlooked by an inexperienced eye. Surprisingly, the beauty and colors are just as stunning from a butterfly in Brazil, a crayfish in Australia, or some tiny fungi in Indonesia.

With incredible photos and clear text, this book provides a visual lesson of orchids’ natural habitats in these rich, tropical forests. So now is your opportunity to visit tropical rainforests all over the world, and skip the bug spray.

I’ve heard orchid growers say that if nothing’s dying, then you’re not learning anything. True to form, when I kill an orchid, I try to figure out what went wrong so that I don’t repeat the mistake. With my coroner’s hat on, I’ll show you these pictures from happier times, before this orchid kicked the bucket last month.

This little orchid has quite a long name, Chondrorhyncha lendyana. It’s native to mountainous cloud forests from Mexico to Costa Rica. A few years ago I bought it at the San Francisco Orchid Show, and it bloomed reliably. This past spring, however, all its new leaves turned black and died. Thinking that it needed to be repotted, I discovered that this kind of orchid really doesn’t like having its roots disturbed. I repotted it anyway, and then it slowly dropped all its remaining leaves.

Ultimately, the problem was that I bought an orchid that I couldn’t properly care for.  This Chondrorhyncha should have been grown on a mount, not in a pot. When grown on a mount, repotting is unnecessary. However, mounted orchids with bare roots need constant high humidity and lots of watering. Since I don’t have a greenhouse or an automated watering system, that’s tough for me to guarantee all the time. In a pot, it only lasted about 3 years, but at least I could enjoy its flowers for a little while. Lesson learned, for now…

Besides saving whales and fighting corporate polluters, Greenpeace has successfully saved orchids and their habitats for decades. By working to preserve rainforests and wetlands, Greenpeace ensures essential wild spaces that orchids need. Over the years, their work has protected ancient forests all over the world, including orchid habitats in Brazil, Central Africa, and Indonesia. Greenpeace is also battling global warming, one of the worst threats to orchids. Through nonviolent direct action, lobbying, and research, Greenpeace is a strong voice all over the world for protection of the environment.

When Greenpeace was founded in Vancouver, Canada in 1971, its original purpose was to fight nuclear bomb tests. Over the years, the organization’s focus changed to environmental issues. Greenpeace now has offices in more than 40 countries around the world, and over 3 million financial contributors. Its international headquarters are located in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.