Thursday, October 30, 2008

Psychilis krugii at Guanica State Forest









On February 27, 2006, I went to Guanica State Forest to try to find and photograph some variations of the orchid Psychilis krugi. The area is very dry and hot and during the "wet" season it is also horribly mosquito infested (now is the dry season). I had a hard time finding somebody to accompany me. I asked a female friend if she could go with me. I told her that there would be poisonous plants, the odd loathsome insect and fearsomely prickly cactus. She said that she would go since it would be a refreshing change from having to deal with her ex-husband.I went to an area that is rarely visited as the most well traveled areas have been nearly stripped of orchids.We had to hike for a while but when we arrived we found hundreds of plants but very, very few flowers. In fact we saw only three flowers. However the plants had many inflorescenses and probably in a month or two there will be a huge number of flowers.

2 comments:

Tropicalgardener said...

Please contact me...my name Frank Flanagan and I live in Puerto Rico. I am a naturalist and I often see many of the plants you have so beautifully photographed. I have a flickr site: tropicalgardener

Please contact me at tropicalgardener@gmail.com

Tropicalgardener said...

I have been here twice and seen many flowering orchids, but little variety...this is a very hardy plant!