A peculiar Phalaenopsis: Phal. Center Stage 'Pine Ridge Cockleshell' AM/AOS, a rare stable peloric form

This is a very peculiar flower.  This orchid petals are unique in what only can be described as a Roscharchian way.  Unfortunately a photo can't approach the experience of looking at an inflorescence of these orchids in the flesh.   But it has been some years since I last saw a plant of this cross.  I wonder if it has gone out of fashion and has been superseded by new and even more unusual hybrids.  This plant won an AM/AOS when exhibited in St. Croix as a cut inflorescence by Irma Selles.

A rare hybrid of Dendrobium farmeri and Dendrobium densiflorum

The flowers of the hybrid look like those of Den. farmeri var. albiflorum but the structure of the lip and the distribution of color are slightly different

The plant packed for transportation to a local orchid society meeting where it won the "plant of the month" award.

To the left, Dendrobium farmeri var. albiflorum, to the right the hybrid of farmeri and densiflorum

Several inflorescenses together show the dense arrangement of flower that this plant has inherited from the densiflorum parent

This hybrid is more floriferous than either parent but can be erratic on its blooming patterns with several inflorescences opening together of one or two at a time over several months.

This rare Dendrobium farmieri x densiflorum hybrid combines the dense and long inflorescence of densiflorum with the white-yellow flowers of farmeri.   When I got this plant, years ago, as tiny seedlings I found that it grew well albeit a bit slowly.  In time it started blooming and producing large and dense inflorescences.  Unfortunately I lost one of my plants to rot after a repotting.  This seems to be a big problem locally with these plants and other related to farmeri and densiflorum, they grow very well but damage to the root and the stems during repotting can result in the rotting of the stems.  As a result now I am potting these plants in baskets and avoiding repotting them as long as possible.

Unlike densiflorum and farmeri which bloom once or at most twice in a season this hybrid usually blooms once with several inflorescences at the same time and the rest of the year it can produce inflorescences at irregular intervals.  It can be cultivated in an identical manner as farmeri or densiflorum but seems to be less dependent in seasonal cues to bloom.  I tried to grow this plant into a specimen but the loss of older canes to rot made this impossible.  I would love to find source for this hybrid to replace the plant I lost but so far it seems that nobody has made it again. 

The flowers of this hybrid are very much like farmeri with little to betray the densiflorum ancestry.  You have to look at the flowers closely to see the way they differ from farmeri.  The differences are mainly in the lip, the orange-yellow color of the lip extends almost to the tip of the lip, the upper side lobes of the lip don’t close over the column and the lip is more elongated.  The canes of the plant however are larger than those of farmeri and have a clear resemblance to the canes of densiflorum.  As far as I now this plant is quite rare in cultivation, I have yet to see one exhibited in a local show.  Hopefully someone will make this hybrid again as it has much to recommend it.

Campylocentrum filiforme, a bizzare native orchid that challenges our concept of what an orchid must be

Campylocentrum filiforme, the stems visible in the photo are new and old inflorescences and not the main plant body which is buried under the roots

The roots you see criss crossing the branch in the photo are the orchid, no leaves or stem is visible, inflorescences with seed pods are visible in the center of the photo

A close view

A close up shows the roots which look silvery white when they are dry but turn green when wet, both live and dead roots are visible in the photo

Campylocentrum filiforme ranks among the most bizarre of all of our native orchids.  What people universally regard to be the “orchid”, and I am referring here to the plant body, in this species has become reduced to an extreme degree.  The stem of this plant has been reduced to the point that it barely reaches a centimeter in length.  And the centimeter of stem that comprises the plant body is practically invisible due to the many roots that surround it.  In this species the roots dominate to such an extent that the plant is predominantly a tangle of roots with the stem forming a vanishingly small proportion of the biomass of the plant.

As a result this plant is the orchid world equivalent of a ghost.  Due to the apparent absence of a stem most people fail to recognize this plant as an orchid or even as a discrete plant.  Perhaps a particularly observant person might notice that there are orchid roots growing around the twigs and branches but since there are no leaves in sight anywhere it is probably that it will fail to perceive that the tangle of roots itself is the orchid.

This orchid is regarded as among the most advanced, from an evolutionary stand point, of all orchids.  The plant has abandoned the stem as a locus of photosynthesis and has shifted this function entirely to the roots.  What advantage can this radical departure from the norm of the plant world can this adaptation give this orchid?

The most accepted theory is that the leave less condition of the plant allows it to survive on the meagrest of resources, in a niche where no other plant can compete successfully or even survive.  These plants are mainly found in places where humidity is abundant such as swamps and moist forest areas but I have them also growing in disturbed areas.   Because they depart from most people conception of what a plant must be they are utterly invisible to the average person.  Because they survive with such limited resources these plants are not known to produce large or showy flowers but there are a few exceptions.

 Dendrophylax lindenii, the Florida Ghost orchid, another leave less species of orchid, made news all over the world when a plant in a reserve produced nine flowers at the same time, an unusual event.  The plant itself could hardly be distinguished in the photos from the bark of the tree where it was growing so, on first sight, the inflorescences with their large showy flowers looked like they were springing from the trunk of the tree.

Campylocentrum filiforme is classified as a rare orchid by Ackermann in his book on orchids of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.  But it may be that it is more abundant that records indicate given its stealthy nature.  Apparently nothing is known about the pollination of this species.  It is not in cultivation and probably almost all local orchid growers are unaware that these plants exist.  I have never seen then on exhibition even in shows where there have been displays specifically devoted to native orchids.  Seems to be short lived in the wild as all the plants I monitored died when the twigs in which they were growing decayed.

Cochleanthes flabelliformis the Puerto Rican orchid with the largest flowers

Cochleantes flabelliformis, note that the lip has some damage, probably caused by animals or insects.

A newly open flower, of a plant in situ

Aside view of the flower

A mature flower, in a plant in situ

A developing seed pod

The seed pod has been raised using a dry twing to allow for a better  photograph.  Notice the Caracolus caracolla snails under the plant.

There are three flowers that I regard as the Holy Grail of wild orchid photographers in Puerto Rico.  One is Lepanthes eltoroensis, of which I know of a single photo taken in the wild.  Another is Sudamerlycaste barrintoniae of which I know of only one poor photo from the pre-digital times.  The last is Cochleanthes flabelliformis of which I had never seen a photo of a plant from Puerto Rico growing in the wild.  All these orchids are considered quite rate and the location of known populations (for obvious reasons) are well kept secrets.  So you can imagine my excitement when a botanist friend that knows my interest in photographing this orchid informed that he had located a plant.

Although a plant was accessible for photographing, as is the often the case with orchids, it was not blooming so I had to patiently wait for the blooming season to arrive, I checked the plant from time to time until in August 2008 when I was overjoyed to discover that it started showing signs that it was going to bloom .  The plant, a relatively weak specimen growing in deep shade, eventually produced a single flower.   The flower was somewhat different from what I have seen in pictures and drawings of this species, as you can see in the photo.

The flower produced a seed pod which I was able to photograph before it opened sometime after December.  The plant bloomed again in 2009 and produced a larger flower which I attribute to it getting more light courtesy of some help from a passing orchidist.  This flower didn’t produce a seed pod.  In 2010 the plant seemed to die, only a stump and some dead looking roots remained as evidence of its existence.  But in November of 2010 a tiny side shoot appeared on the side of the dead root mass so this plant may yet bloom again.  If it ever does so I will be ready to get more photos.

This plant is a mystery to me in the sense that even though it is horticultural desirable, being the largest flowered orchid native of Puerto Rico, I have not seen it anywhere in cultivation in Puerto Rico either in local orchid collections or in orchid shows.  Since over collection from the wild has been given as a reason for this plant rarity I would have expected to see it at shows and at local collections.   But this is not the case, in fact the only time I have seen a exhibit that purported to show a specimen of this orchid the plant was actually Cochleantes discolor.

My suspicion is that this orchid does not survive in cultivation in local collections.  I know there are local orchid growers of unsurpassed skill which can maintain rare and difficult to grow orchids alive and thriving for years and years, but those are a small minority.  The majority of local orchid growers are totally unfamiliar with the environmental needs of orchids native to the forests of the mountainous interior of the island.  This means that almost all of the orchids collected from the central highlands usually die slow lingering deaths at the hands of hobbists whose enthusiasm surpasses their knowledge.

Although this plant is rare and local in the wild I don’t think it is in danger of extinction.  The remaining populations are in pretty rugged terrain which is extremely unlikely to be haunted by orchid growers.   Perhaps someone could gather a seed pod and make it available to the orchid community so that nobody had the need or the interest to get plants from the wild?  I will keep this thought in mind.

A curious thing that mystified me was that I found two large Caracolus caracolla snails resting in the leaf litter just under the leaves of this orchid.  These snails are voracious eaters of tender orchid leaves and stems.  Why they ignored the comparatively thin leaves of this orchid instead of devouring them completely is a small mystery.

Lepanthes caritensis a rare Puerto Rican endemic orchid

Lepanthes caritensis

This orchid is rarely seen and even less often photographed.   Found only in particular mountains of the east of Puerto Rico this orchid is quite tiny and often overlook.  At one time they were thought to ocurr in a very restricted area where only 196 individuals were known to ocurr.  Amazingly half of the plants of the species were found in a single tree!  But it now appears to have a wider distribution than was realized.  I found a few plants but sadly after hurricane Earl thinned the canopy in the area where they grew they dissapeared.   Hopefully one day I will find more plants to photograph.  This plant is not in circulation in the orchid growing circles, I know of just a single plant in captivity.  The photo I saw of the plant is apparently being cared by a particularly skilled orchidist as shows it thriving under cultivation.  However I ask you not to remove these plants from the wild as keeping them healthy and alive away from their natural habitat is not and endeavour for the casual orchidist and most likely will result in the death of the plant.