Bulbophyllum sumatranum flowers, produced by the same mass of growths two weeks appart in March.

Bulbophyllum sumatranum Garay, Hamer & Siegrist 1996, now larger than ever

This orchid has totally overflowed the wire basket in which it is growing.  Now many growths are growing on the sides of the baskets or between or over, older growths.  An attempt to start pieces growing in a basket with coconuts chunks was a complete disaster, the plant never bloomed and one really, really wet season, it completely rotted away.  Yes, as unbelievable as it sound it did rot, something that is almost unheard in my collection in which all my Bulbophyllum seem to  tolerate without complaint even the wettest of weathers,  I plant to start transplanting pieces of this orchid to a log of teak wood to see how it will fare growing on this type of mount.  Hopefully it will be more floriferous there.  This clone is prone to bloom unpredictably and erratically, generally between March and May.

BOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!

Some Bulbophyllum that have bloomed in late Autumn and early Winter in 2014-2015

Bulbophyllum sumatranum

Bulbophyllum blumei

Bulbophyllum lobbii var. Malacca

Bulbophyllum Elizabeth Ann

Bulbophyllum Lovely Elizabeth

Bulbophyllum lepidum

Bulbophyllum longissimum

Bulbophyllum lasiochilum - dark form

Bulbophyllum Melting Point

Bulbophyllum sumatranum Garay, Hamer & Siegrist 1996, culture notes, it has become a mass of growths that both delight and infuriates

In 2012 it bloomed from leafless pseudobulbs

In 2014 you can see two flowers trapped among the roots and stems

The plant in 2014, an unruly pile of pseudobulbs, roots and stems  There are three flower buds in the photo.  An aborted flower bud, red colored, is also visible

After three years in my collection, Bulbophyllum sumatranum has become a relatively large plant witn many growths.  It has bloomed in the past but not as often as I would like.  Today I discovered that it has been producing inflorescences but that some of they have been produced by stems that are under a tangle of roots and pseudobulbs.  I also found four other inflorescences that are right in the middle of a mess of leaves and pseudobulbs which means they might not have room to expand to their full size.  I was delighted by the vigorous growth of this plant and its beautiful flowers, but its tendency to form a tangled mass of growths can be frustrating.  I plant to take a piece and attach it to a fern pole to see if grown this way it is easier to tame and it will display its flowers better.

Here are some notes on its culture on my garden

Potting: In a eight inch wire basket.

Media: A layer of medium bark about one inch deep.

Fertilizing: A high nitrogen fertilizer is used when the plant is growing. None is given outside the growing season.

Light: Full morning sun from 8:00 am to 11:00 am light shade the rest of the day.

Watering: The local rain is enough to cover this plant needs outside the rainy season.  In the rainy season it rains every day for the whole summer so the plant is constantly wet for months.  In the dry season, a whole month can pass with no measurable rain, during this time the plant is thoroughly drenched once a week.  If the plant is producing flowers it might get watered every day.

                         J       F      M       A       M       J       J       A       S      O      N      D

Rainfall (mm)   99    76     84     165    283    155   141   216    237  233  176   135

(inches)            3.9   3.0    3.3    6.5     11.1    6.1   5.5    8.5     9.3   9.1   6.9     5.3

Temperature

                J     F    M    A     M    J     J   A     S     O    N    D

High        28   29   30   30   31   32   32  32    32   31   30   29

Low          19   20   20   21   21   22   24  23    22   21   20   19

Bulbophyllum sumatranum

I brought this plant in the summer of 2011 from a vendor in Hawaii.  It arrived in excellent condition with nice plump pseudobulbs and immaculate leaves.  I put it in my terrace and waited for flowers, and waited, and waited.  The plant stayed the same for the rest of the year.  Given that it was an adult plant I had assumed that it would bloom in the summer as do many Bulbophyllum.  I gave routine care to this plant for the rest of the year with little evidence of any effect, good or ill.  In late April 2012 I started watering it almost daily with a weak fertilizer solution.  I did this because almost all of my Bulbophyllum start producing new growths during March or April which locally is the second half of the dry season.  In late April sumatranum finally started producing a new growth.  The new growth came out of a pseudobulb that is part of a chain of pseudobulbs that escaped from the pot and are growing in the air.  Nevertheless because of the frequent watering an local high humidity it is growing quite well.  In the second week of May I was delighted to find that an inflorescence was growing out of one of the older pseudobulbs.  In May 16 the flower opened.  So far the plant has only one active growing point and one inflorescence but I expect that as the season progresses more vegetative, and hopefully, floral buds will start to develop.