Dendrobium Chaisri Gold, peloric mutant

I received this Dendrobium as a gift a long time ago.  It is not difficult to cultivate as long as it is grown on media that doesn't become soggy and kills its roots.  Prefers media that allows for plenty of air to reach the roots.  The flowers are long lasting.

Psychilis x raganii Sauleda, I photographed several plants to see the flower variation

These orchids were growing in the eroded face of a hill, under and between spiny bushes and stunted trees.  The substrate was mud and loose stone, a mixture that made walking around challenging and dangerous.  The angle of the side of the hill varied between 45 and 60 degrees.  In some spots the bushes were a solid impassable mass.  In the steepest places there were no plants at all but only bare rock.  Most of the area was a crazy quilt of continuos vegetation, eroded spots, bare rock places and stunted grass patches.

Yamadara Sammie Evans, Mayaguez orchid society show, September 2016

Calanthe Vintage Wine 'Mendenhall' x Calanthe Rozel 'Red Velvet, first blooming

This is the first blooming of this hybrid for me.  The flowers are a lovely shade of red.  For some reason the plants have not grown as well as I had hoped.  However I plan to move them to a sunnier spot and see what happens.

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Calanthe (Vintage Wine 'Mendenhall' x Rozel 'Red Velvet) frist bloom

First bloom to open in my garden of this Calanthe hybrid.  I like the color.  The plants are very easy to cultivate but few people in Puerto Rico culture them.  

Bulbophyllum patens King 1896, an orchid with upward facing flowers

Photographed at a friend's shade house.  This Asian orchid need high humidity and hot temperatures to grow well.  The flowers open facing upwards.

Phalaenopsis Fusheng's Sweet Paradise 'Golden Leopard'

The color combination of the Phalaenopsis hybrid is very eye catching.  It used to be that flowers with these colors were small, this is not the case of this flower.  It may not be the size of a classical white Phalenopsis, but it is clear the hybridizers are well on their way to achieve this bold color combinations on large sized flowers.

Thanks to Irma Saldana, which provided the identification of this orchid.

Bulbophyllum lepidum flowers, a close up reveals interesting colors, textures and patterns

A close up view of the flowers of Bulbophyllum lepidum reveals interesting colors, textures and patterns.  Local flies go crazy about these flowers and it is not rare to see some of the small ones with pollinia of this species on their backs,

Oncidium Sharry Baby 'Sweet Fragrance'

This Oncidium hybrid has many virtues, it is relatively easy to grow, can be forgiving of neglect and if well cared for, it can produce large inflorescences of deliciously fragrant flowers that produce a powerful chocolate fragrance.  A single large mature pseudobulb can produce two inflorescences at the same time and those can carry dozens of flowers.  I have read that some people don't like the leaves of this orchid because they are not the smooth green of other Oncidium but can be covered with tiny blemishes, but to me this is a minor defect.  The flowers are so nice that it is easy to overlook the leaves.  Best of all mature plants can be found in many places from specialist orchid vendors to department stores.  Good sized and well bloomed plants can often be obtained at reasonable prices.

How I cultivate this plant:

Light:  Young plants get bright shade, adult plants get a few hours of sun in the morning but are sheltered from the harsh midday sunlight.  Giving the plants as much light as they can stand without burning has given me the best results.

Watering:  Almost every day when the plant is producing its pseudobulbs, particularly the phase where the pseudobulb is increasing in size.

Fertilizer:  In every watering when the plant is producing new growths.  No fertilizer when it is blooming or not growing.

Potting media: It seems to grow equaly well in bark, tree fern and coconut husk pieces. 

Temperature: Summer: 85F day, 75F night, winter 75F day, 65F night.

Lepanthes woodburyana one of the commonest endemic Lepanthes

Lepanthes woodburyana

Sierra palm forest/elfin forest transcition area, many Lepanthes are found here.  The ground is from wet to soping wet year round.  The view is toward Pico del Este

Sometimes the inflorescence is over the top of the leaf instead of under it which is the norm.

This plant was found in the Sierra Palm forest

Two inflorescences plus one seed capsule





A plant at a local orchid show, a rare sight indeed.  The many stems and flowers on the plant speak of a skilled and knowledgeable grower.

Lepanthes woodburyana is one of the most common Lepanthes species I have seen in El Yunque forest. They can be found growing in tree trunks, twigs and riverside boulders. They seem to do best in areas where the environmental humidity remains consistently high year round such as the margins of rivers and creeks. It might be a startling thought that humidity could be low in such a place as a rainforest but I have had the experience of visiting the forest at a time when a dry period has lingered long enough for the moss in the trunks of trees to become bone dry. I suspect that these plants are vulnerable to the spells of dry weather and low humidity that sometimes happen even in the depths of the rainforest. The reason I think these plants are vulnerable to spells of unfavorable weather is because over the years I have seen groups and colonies of these plants suddenly disappear from places where they were common and easy to find. At first I was alarmed when a group of plants could not be found and even thought that someone in the orchid hobby had collected them. But when plants disappeared from sites where the possibility of them having been collected was unlikely in the extreme I discarded this possibility. Also the number of orchid growers that grow Lepanthes in the island of PR is so vanishingly small that I have yet to see a single native Lepanthes in cultivation in the collections of any of the many orchidists that I know personally. However they do show up, on rare ocassions, at orchid shows. In fact if you ask local orchidists about Lepanthes many will be unfamiliar with them and of the remainder that do know them most would hardly consider them a subject fit for cultivation. For most orchid growers in PR growing orchids means keeping large flowered Classic Cattleyas, in this light Lepanthes, and many other tiny flowered genera have flowers that are simply too insignificant to bother with.

Because of this unpopularity the local Lepanthes are happily left alone in the wild and to survive or die on their own terms and according to the vagrancies of the seasons and the climate. My biggest difficulty with the local Lepanthes is the lack of photos of plants whose identity has been certified by a botanical authority. Even with the botanical descriptions, the taxonomic keys and line drawings are a challenge for an amateur, it can be difficult to determine the ID of a plant without a color drawing or photo.

There are several Lepanthes species in PR and perhaps with a single exception, they are not endangered or particularly rare in their favored habitats. They can be easily found in the wild habitat but you will have to bring a magnifying glass to really enjoy their beauty. They are best left in their native haunts because they will not tolerate even slight neglect in cultivation. A Cattleya can easily endure two weeks without watering with no ill consequences. Lepanthes will die the moment they desiccate which can happen in less than a week during particularly windy spell in the dry season or at the height of the summer when temperatures are at their yearly peak.