Bulbophyllum rothschildianum (O’Brien) J.J. Smith (1912) , not difficult to grow in Puerto RIco, but susceptible to scales

This species comes from India and Thailand.¹  I brought some small seedlings about a decade ago.  They proved to be easy to care for and grew well under the climatic conditions (warm) that are prevalent in my local area.  Unfortunately the plants turned out to be vulnerable to infestation by hard brown scale.  The plants were successfully treated for this insect pest but they apparently suffered considerably and were weakened by the scales.  Scales are an insidious and persistent pest that needs constant vigilance to keep under control.

My plants spent several years without blooming.  The flowers in the photos of this post are the first ones since the infestation.  My plants come from seedlings that were the product of crossing two plants, not from meristem cloning of a selected plant.  As a result my two plants produce somewhat different flowers.  One produced mostly red flowers whose petals at times separate.  The other produces flowers that are variable and can be solid red, stripped in red and green and even have one red sepal and one green/red stripped sepal in the same plant.

The flowers in this blooming of my plant are few and small compared with the inflorescences of an awarded clone that is in optimum conditions.  However I expect that in coming years my plant will grow stronger and better.    A selected clone of this species can have lateral sepals measuring from 13.5 to 15 cm, hopefully my plants will some day approach this size.¹

¹Siegerist, Emly S. 2001. Bulbophyllums and their allies: A grower’s guide

Dendrobium harveyanum Rchb f. 1883, after seven years it is still doing well

 
(I wrote an article about this species in 2011, here I revisit some of my old observations and add a few new ones)

This orchid comes from Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, and the Yunnan province in China.  In spite of its large area of distribution it is rare in the wild.¹   Since its discovery in 1883, this plant was always rare, and for a long time it was totally lost to cultivation.²   Plants of this species were discovered in northern Thailand and then reentered cultivation.²   Unfortunately, even after it was rediscovered, this plant remained generally unavailable for many years, one could only enjoy its beauty in the occasional photo in a book or an orchid magazine.

When I first saw the flowers this orchid in a book, I was immediately captivated by their unique characteristics.  That was in 1990, back then I could find no source of these orchids in the United States.  I know this sound quaint in the age of the Internet, but back then you had to peruse through orchid magazines, select those vendors that might have the orchid, write a letter asking for a checklist, and then wait for weeks or months to see if you would get an answer.

In 2006 I finally found a source and was able to buy three plants.  Unsure how they would adapt to the local conditions, I mounted one on a branch and potted the other two in wire baskets.  The plant in the branch did poorly and even thought it bloomed, it did so weakly and eventually died.  It died even after I had removed it from the branch and planted it in a basket like the other two plants.

The two plants in the baskets did well and two years later bloomed.  They have bloomed unfailingly every year, sometimes several times in the year, since that time.  The two plants have responded in slightly different ways to basket culture.  One of the plants has grown slowly and is still well within the confines of the basket, the other one was a vigorous grower and grew to the edges of the basket and has continued growing on its sides.  I have never repotted these plants as I suspect that damage to their root system would severely set them back.  As for their culture, I followed the advice to grow them like I grow my Dendrobium farmeri.³

As you can see, all plants responded in a different way to cultivation under my conditions.  One peculiarity is that the most vigorous plant produces keikis from time to time every time a cane loses its base to rot.  The other two never produced keikis.  These plants are unbothered by most pests in my area.  A single pest is capable of damaging them severely is snails.  When a new cane is growing snails have been known to attack the tender leaves.  This has resulted in the plants being set back and weakened.  The result was poor blooming in the cane that sustained the damage.  On rare occasions, canes that are growing have developed rot in the growing tip and died.  It is unclear what has caused this.

Considering how rare this plant has been in cultivation, it was a bit surprising that it has proven to grow well with little special treatment.  It can withstand the local dry season with ease, with no watering, even when a whole month goes without raining.   Outside of its growing season I give it no fertilizing.

The two plants produce inflorescences at any time between late April and July.  Different canes of the same plant can bloom all together or at different times in the same year.  My plants have produced inflorescences with as little as two flowers and as many as thirteen.  I thought the flowers were slightly fragrant until one occasion when I brought a plant in the house.  In late morning I found that the flowers had become powerfully fragrant, much more fragrant than I had ever noticed.   Next time this orchid blooms I shall see if this was a onetime event or whether it always happens but I had never noticed.  Flowers can vary slightly in color and size of the lip but I have not checked if this a characteristic that varies between the different plant or the different bloomings.

One thing I have noted is that my plants have remained relatively small, with canes that rarely grow over six inches tall.   I have seen photos in the Internet of plants that seem to have canes taller than seven inches, but this has not been my experience.  Only once has my plant produced a cane larger than seven inches, a cane that was produced in the 2013 growing season and that topped its growth at eight inches (20 centimeters).  The size of the mature canes of this plant has been cited as being between 6 and 9 inches (17 and 23 cm)¹ and five and eight (15 and 20 cm).³

Given the relatively small adult size of this plant, it often is overlooked when visitors come to my garden and are greeted by Grammatophyllum and Vandachnis that literally tower over all other plants.  But when they are in bloom, the unique, canary yellow flowers of this orchid are truly eye catching.   In my experience this is a plant that is well worth growing. 

 

¹Baker, Margaret L. 1996. Orchid Species Culture.  Dendrobium.  Margaret L. Baker and Charles O. Baker.

²Menzies, David. 1991. Orchids.

³Schelpe, S., Steward, J.  1990 Dendrobium an introduction to the species in cultivation.

Habenaria erichmichaelii Christenson 2003, An orchid that is pretty in pink.

This orchid is similar to Habenaria rhodocheila. It differs from rhodocheila in that the color of its flowers is pink, the plant body has a smaller size and the leaves have silvery markings, it is native of Thailand.¹   I have had this plant for a decade now and I can attest that it is quite rewarding to grow. 

There are a few things that you need to do to help this plant bloom to its best.  The first thing to know is that this plant loses its leaves after setting seed and becomes dormant, all that remains of the plant are the underground tubers. Because of this, for half the year, the pot where it grows looks empty.  I have known people that threw their plants away in disappointment when the saw the leaves die.

When the plant is dormant, I give it absolutely no care.  The only thing I do is weed the pot from time to time to keep the weeds and ferns from taking over.  My plants survive nicely even though the pot gets wet when it rains.  When the plant starts sprouting new leaves I start giving it plenty of water and fertilizer.  I even put a top dressing of manure over the soil in the pot to make sure the plants have plenty of nitrogen available.  These plants grow fast, if you fail to give them what they need to grow strongly you will end up with small and few flowered plants.

 

In my locality these plants start growing in May which is the start of the rainy season here, so watering is not an issue.  The plants grow fast and bloom between the end of August and the beginning of September.   After the plants blooms the leaves start looking awful and by December the plant has shed all its leaves.

It is important to protect the leaves from insects.  If the leaves are damaged the plant will bloom poorly and next year it might come back smaller, weaker and it might not bloom.  Although you can mostly ignore the pot for half the year, this is not a plant that thrives on neglect when it is growing.

I have seen a few plants of Habenaria rhodocheila in cultivation in Puerto Rico, but Hab. erichmichaelii seem to be less common locally.  Unfortunately its blooming season doesn’t coincide with any of the mayor orchid shows in Puerto Rico.  Given that it grows well in the local climate it’s a bit surprising that more people don’t grow this plant.

¹La Croix, I. F.  2008. The new encyclopedia of orchids: 1500 species in cultivation

Bulbophyllum tricornoides Seidenfaden (1979)

This is a species that is native of Thailand¹.  This orchid is not mine, it is cultivated by a friend that lives in the town of Aguadilla, Puerto Rico.   He lives a few hundred feet from the seashore, this means that humidity is good year round.  This is an important consideration with Bulbophyllum because some species don’t grow well if humidity is low.  His plants are hung over several aquariums which also helps maintain good humidity.  In his location temperatures are always warm and in summer they can go over 90F.

This plant grows well and blooms abundantly in coastal Puerto Rico.  As you can see in the photos it will roam all over the pot or basket and won’t hesitate to send growth under the basket if it is grown in one.   The inflorescences can be erect or hanging.   The plant can produce several inflorescences at the same time if in good condition.  It is grown under saran   cloth.It is interesting that, although Bulbophyllum is not a particularly popular genus among the average orchid grower, when looking at the collections of more dedicated growers you can find all sort of species that are rarely seen locally.  

 

¹ Siegerist, Emily S.  2001.  Bulbophyllum and their allies: a grower’s guide

Bulbophyllum angustifolium (Blume) Lindley (1830), a miniature botanical curiosity that is quite floriferous

In this photo you can see the long internodes between pseudobulbs

I got this tiny plant as a gift from a friend.  It is a twig epiphyte of the mountainous areas of Thailand, Malaya and Java¹.  This is a plant that is smaller than most commercially available Bulbophyllum, its pseudobulbs less than an inch tall, they are thin and the leaf is much larger than the pseudobulb.  The pseudobulbs are widely spaced along a rambling stem.

I didn’t put this plant in its own mount or pot.  My friend’s plant was an untidy tangle of stems going in every direction around and under a slated basket.  I decided to put the orchid on the top of a basket where a plant of Bulbophyllum Elizabeth Ann was growing so that it could ramble to its heart’s content.  Potting this plant would have is an exercise in futility as, due the long internodes the new growths surely would  end up out of the pot unless a grossly inpractical and oversized pot was used.  The plant grew well and eventually started growing out of the basket.  I kept twisting the stems back to the sides of the basket, because otherwise they grew out into the air.  My plant bloomed profusely with many inflorescences at the same time.

Sadly, I lost this plant.  I lost in a particularly embarrassing way.  Since the plant was growing and blooming well I assumed that it didn’t need much attention, but, as happened to me with other Bulbophyllum, eventually the pseudobulbs started growing away from the basket and into the air.  The result of this was that the stems were hanging from the basket, held back only by the older growths.  When the roots on the older growths died and decomposed, the pieces of the plant with the newest pseudobulbs would fall to the ground where they would lie unnoticed among the leaf litter only to be swept away when I passed the leaf blower.  That is a hazard with this plant, because all the parts of the plant are small and comparatively thin, it is easy to miss it if a piece falls from the mount.

One day I checked the basket and discovered that all the stems were old or dead and none had an active growing tip.   My advice on this plant is to mount it on a plaque that allows it to roam at will but never neglect the task of bending back the new growths that are growing into the air so that they are back in contact with the mount.    This plant grew well under my environmental conditions which are pretty humid during the rainy season.  The inflorescence of this orchid is short and the flowers are small.  The flowers are white with yellow tips.  Although this plant is small it can produce a nice showing when in full bloom, particularly if it has many pseudobulbs.  It is not common among local growers.

¹ Siegerist, Emily S.  2001.  Bulbophyllum and their allies: a grower’s guide

Bulbophyllum longissimum, like slender and delicate pink tentacles of Cthulhu

Freshly opened flowers

Fully opened flowers

This orchid is found in Thailand, Burma and Malaysia.  The flowers of my plant open at ten inches long and eventually elongate to eleven.  It has proven to be easy to care for and trouble free, probably because the local weather and altitude are similar to those of its natural haunts.  Initially it was a bit of a slow grower, but I think this was because the plant was small.  After its pseudobulbs achieved adults size it has started producing side branches.  The flowers last for about a week in good shape and then start to deteriorate.

Here are some details on the weather and how I care for my plant.

Media: fine bark.

Potting:  It is growing in a eight inch wide home-made wire metal basket.  The plant grows on top of the basket but it is starting to climb down the sides.

Watering:  During the summer this plant gets rain every single day in the afternoon, the media stays constantly wet for months.  During the dry season, if it is not growing it gets a soaking once a week or a bit more frequently if the bulbs start to become furrowed.

Humidity: The local weather provides the right amount of humidity for this plant most of the year.  Humidity locally fluctuates between 70% and 90% during the day.  At the height of the dry season humidity might go down to 50% for a few hours a day but climbs over 70 at night.  At the height of the wet season it can stay close to 100% during the night.

Fertilizing: A fertilizer with a high nitrogen content,  two times a week when it is producing new growths.  I stop fertilizing when the new growths achieve mature size.  I don’t’ fertilize if the plant is not producing either new growths or roots.

Light: It gets bright light, it is with my Cattleyas, it gets full sun early in the morning and the rest of the day it is under the shade of trees.  It is not in deep shade.

Temperature: From 95 F high day to 75 F at night during the summer, 80F to 60F during the night in winter.

Care: Under my conditions, this plant thrives with routine care.

Pests:  None so far, insects have not attacked the plant, it is in a place innacesible to slugs, and fungus and bacteria have not been an issue.

Grammatophyllum speciosum

Grammatophyllum speciosum, this is a picture of the adult plant 
as it was when it produced its first inflorescence.

Grammatophyllum speciosum produces imperfect flowers near the base of the inflorescence, this may alarm those growers that are not aware of this particular trait of this genus. Flowers that are away from the base are normal.

The lip of the normal flower

This is the normal flower of Grammatophyllum speciosum

I got this plant of Grammatophyllum speciosum as a gift in June 1997. It was a two cane seedling, the largest cane was about two inches tall. It was a gift from Donato Segui. During the first few years, when it still relatively small I used to lavish care on it. But as it grew and became bigger and bigger, I started to care for it less. Eventually it ended up in the garden where it was planted in a pedestal made out of rock.

Last year a car hit the pedestal and destroyed it. The plant suffered only a slight damage but I had to drag it away from the spot where it was growing to where it s now.  Perhaps the change of place triggered flowering and it bloomed after this event.  It started flowering early in March, eleven years after I received it.

The flowers of this plant look somewhat different from the type of Gramm. speciosum that seems to be common in botanical collections. It is greener and has less maroon color. A google search located a photo of a plant almost identical to mine. It is growing in the Khao Yai National Park in Thailand.The parent of this plant was brought to Puerto Rico around the middle of the last century by a college professor, Dr. Juan A. Rivero. He apparently acquired the plant during a visit to South East Asia. 

For many years Dr. Rivero's plant was as far as I know the only one in the west of the island. In the middle nineties he selfed his plant and grew many seedlings. These seedlings were sold by a nursery in Cabo Rojo. There are several of these plants around the west of the island that still survive. Under my care this plant has been found to be fairly undemanding, and practically plague free. In my locality the climate supplies most of this plant’s growing needs as far as water, humidity and temperature.This orchid forms large clumps that can reach amazing sizes, a gigantic one that weighted about two tons was exhibited in Britain in the Crystal Palace in 1851 and was one of the centerpieces of that year’s exhibition.

Media: Bark, after the root basket formed, none.

Potting: First on well drained plastic pots, then on a very strong metal basket.

Fertilizing: 20-20-20 when it was in a pot. When it was large enough to put in a wire basket I stopped giving it liquid fertilizer and started pouring two or three cups of horse manure on top of the root ball at the start of the growing season and kept replacing it as it degraded and got washed away by the rain.

Light: Full morning sun, light shade after midday, It gets this regime because it is what is available on the only spot that I had to put this plant.

Temperature: From 95F high during the day in summer to 60F during the night in winter. Said to withstand temperatures down to 45F.

Care: Staking up the canes when necessary to allow the grass mower to pass. It is important to keep checking for the snails and slugs that may attack the inflorescence as soon as they get the slightest whiff of its existence. Regular grooming to remove dead canes and to keep the plant tidy go a long way toward helping this plant stay healthy.