AboutOrchids

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that tens of thousands of wild orchids have bloomed around Canberra. After a very wet winter across the Australian Capital Territory, dozens of different orchid species are putting on a show. With common names like Donkey Orchids, Beard Orchids, and Helmet Orchids, they have a myriad of fascinating sizes and shapes. Government conservation officer Dr. Michael Mulvaney added “There are as many orchids [species] on Black Mountain than there are in the whole of Great Britain so we’re blessed by our diversity of orchid.”

Coelia bella is a great orchid species, both easy to grow and easy to pronounce. Its charming purple, white, and yellow flowers give off a light marzipan or almond oil fragrance.

To say Coelia, ignore the “o” and say Celia like the woman’s name, SEE-Lee-Ah. The second part of its Latin name, bella, translates as beautiful. In the wild, this species lives from southern Mexico through Central America in rainforests up to 5000 feet (1500 m) in elevation.

In addition to its lovely flowers, this orchid is also known for its distinctive, egg-shaped pseudobulbs (some of them look more like fat tomatoes than eggs!) My plant happily grows outdoors all year in a partly sunny area next to our house. I give it regular water, fertilizer, and a winter dormancy. This variety can handle a wide range of temperatures. It needs extra care during repotting to avoid damage to roots. The last photo below shows two fat pseudobulbs and a flower spike hanging out of the pot, indicating that my plant is overdue for repotting. But that obviously hasn’t slowed down the flower show on this beautiful Coelia.

The Minnesota Landscape Arboretum is working to conserve rare native orchids. The Arboretum is building a seed bank for all of the state’s 48 native species, including the official state flower, the Showy Lady’s Slipper. The effort is part of a larger conservation project, headed by the Smithsonian Institution, to preserve seeds from all of the USA’s native orchids. Since many of these orchids are rare, and their seeds are as small as dust, collecting them is a real challenge. “A lot of orchids are the first species to disappear from a landscape,” said plant expert David Remucal. “We could be losing a lot of these landscapes over the next 50 years, so we could be losing a lot of these orchid populations.”

Orchids on the rocks? No, it’s not another post about ice cubes or climate change. Instead, it’s about orchids which actually grow on rocks. Attached by their roots, orchids may wedge into stony crevices or hang off sheer mountain cliffs. Many orchids which are air plants can affix to both trees and rocks. The first three photos show a few species which can grow this way: a Dendrobium, a Laelia, and a Sarcochilus.

Plants which grow on rocks are called lithophytes. Gardeners may also hear the word rupicolous, which has the same meaning.  Lithophytes in the orchid family include some Lady Slippers, Dendrobiums, Sarcochilus, Cattleyas, Bulbophyllums, Oncidiums, Angraecums, and many more. Their roots cling to rough stone surfaces, and expand into cracks and crevices to help secure themselves. They may live in pockets of soil or rotting leaves which provide them with nutrients. Some of the pictures below show how their white roots attach to rocks.

Keeping orchids as lithophytes can be tricky. Rock can quickly heat up in direct sun, and flat areas may not drain well, so it’s important to pay careful attention to light, water, and humidity. The standard advice is to grow lithophytes like air plants, keeping them in well-drained pots with bark or moss, rather than risking them on stone. For the adventurous, Growing Orchids in Your Garden by Robert G.M. Friend has a chapter on lithophytes, including which varieties work best.

For more photos of orchid on the rocks, check out this blog post about plants in Cambodia.

From Santa Barbara to Paris to Tasmania, don’t miss these opportunities to see wondrous flowers, take photos, talk with orchid experts, and purchase plants.

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If we ever found flowers on another planet, could they possibly be stranger than these earthly orchids? Some of these blooms look like visitors from Mars or Neptune.

Despite their alien facades, they’re simply members of the enormous orchid family, which has diversity beyond measure. Their long Latin names, like Masdevallia caudivolvula and Sigmatostalix posadarum, are sometimes bigger than the blooms themselves. They may resemble birds in flight or deep sea creatures, but they don’t look much like flowers.

In choosing photos for this post, out of many years of our orchid show pictures, the Bulbophyllums truly stood out. This large, diverse group of orchids has lots of weird blooms. The last row of photos below shows three Bulbophyllum examples, but there were many more. Don’t these flowers look like they could have come from another planet?

AboutOrchids only dabbles in politics related to orchid conservation, and this post is no exception. If you’re an orchid lover, the only choice for president this November is Hillary Clinton. The Republican nominee would be a disastrous decision for many reasons, but the one that’s most important on this blog is saving our endangered planet. That requires science, and Trump is anti-science. This recent article from Scientific American disqualifies him from the job on that single point alone. Fortunately, polls are looking good for Clinton now, but it’s not over til it’s over.

The photos above illustrate three examples of endangered orchid species which need Hillary Clinton to win. These are just a few of many thousands of orchid species which are imperiled by climate change, habitat destruction, pollution, and poaching of wild plants. Hillary Clinton has a strong environmental record, and she has pledged to tackle climate change and other problems. If orchids could vote, their choice would definitely be Hillary Clinton for president.

Japanese scientists have discovered a new parasitic orchid species whose flowers never open.  This strange new Gastrodia species doesn’t photosynthesize, instead stealing nutrients from fungi in the soil. In addition, its peculiar flowers stay closed, and pollinate themselves.

Sobralia flowers never fail to impress. Recently I mentioned this plant in a post about Growing Orchids Outdoors in Pacifica. This Sobralia species bloomed for years outside in our San Francisco garden. It didn’t do so well after our move to the coast, so I finally brought it indoors. After a quick growth spurt, it flowered before we left for our recent trip to Colorado.

These big purple blossoms, with sunny yellow and white centers, only last for a few days, the very definition of fleeting beauty. The first three pictures above show my plant’s recent bloom indoors. The remaining pictures below show blooms from past years, when the plant lived outdoors in our San Francisco garden, They include a great photo of a visit by a spectacular Gulf Fritillary butterfly, warming its wings in the autumn sun, and adding even more beauty to a Sobralia bud.

Australia is home to many unusual plants, including some orchids which hide in plain sight. They grow leaves year after year, but rarely flower, until there’s a bushfire. Pyrorchis nigricans, also known as the Fire Orchid or Red Beak, bursts into bloom in the year after a fire. Learn more about these scorched orchids in Australian Geographic.