Gorgeous flowers and a walk over the mountain

Many of you who know me will know that I have never really had much enthusiasm for the Catlleya alliance. I "inherited" some seriously large and old specimen plants when I purchased the greenhouse from an elderly gentleman earlier this year. The plants were unfortunately neglected but after some loving care they recovered well and many of them have rewarded me with some exotic and very beautiful flowers. I have a new-found fondness for these flowers... and they are growing on me :). I have attached images of flowering Laeliocattleya Tropical Pointer "Galaxy" and Rhyncholaelia digbyana X (Cattleya Snowdrift X C. Eucharis). The latter gives off a very strong fragrance in the morning which fills the entire greenhouse.

Laeliocattleya Tropical Pointer "Galaxy"

Rhyncholaelia digbyana X (Cattleya Snowdrift X C. Eucharis)

This weekend I was invited to visit Bradley in Worcester for a hike up the mountain looking for any local species that might be in flower that we could photograph. We were keen to see if any Disa species were flowering. Apart from the odd Satyrium species that had already finished flowering and had set seeds, we came accross some very interesting species. The Disa atricapilla were out in force and we discovered quite a number of them just about to flower. Unfortunately we could not find any with open blooms. We also found a curious little yellow Ceratandra species. Bradley took some good photos of the flower to get it identified. The walk was great and it was wonderful to see these local species in their natural habitat. What surprised me the most was how confined they seem to be to isolated patches of microhabitat. You could find a significant grouping of these species together in one area but nowhere else for tens or hundreds of metres. I had a wonderful time and I hope that Bradley posts some of his images soon :)

The view

Disa atricapilla

Ceratandra sp. with buds

Bradley preparing to photograph Ceratandra sp. open flower

The new laminar flow and some October babies

Finally, after waiting nearly two months I received my Hepa filter from Germany and installed it into the new laminar flow hood. The laminar flow was built according to the specifications that I put up on the blog in a previous post. I cautiously tested the unit the other day for any contamination. I ran the hood for 30 minutes with an open plate of medium and then incubated the plate for 72 hours to check for microbiological contamination. After all was well, I started to play. I must say that it makes working with seeds and re-plates a lot less stressful. Still, I have a healthy respect for sterility :)

Laminar flow in use

I have had marked success recently with some Dendrobium species from Thailand and some of my own seeds. My dry seed protocol is working well now, even with slightly more sensitive species. I have attached some images of germinating seeds of some of the Dendrobium species and some others below. However, I am having a few issues with Phalaenopsis protocorms. I get good germination but poor protocorm differentiation currently. I am tweaking the media to eliminate possible causes and hopefully soon, through process of elimintaion, I can report back with some better success here. So far, I have managed to raise a few P. lowii protocorms and some P. purple gems. More mother flasks of various hybrids are awaiting germination on tweaked media.

Dendrobium griffithianum

Dendrobium hercoglossum

Dendrobium heterocarpum

Dendrobium lituiflorum

Dendrobium parishii

Dendrobium signatum



Dendrobium wardianum



Anacheilium cochleatum

Dendrobium annosum

My Eulophias are also doing very well. I seem to have tackled the proliferation problem of the protocorms with a change of media type and have since moved some seedlings of Eulophia speciosa into the greenhouse to grow on further. I have attached some images here of Casper's E. angolensis and E. clavicornis that are nearing readiness to be sent off. I have also included images of the developing seedlings of Bradley's Mystacidium capense and my Polystachya anceps.

Casper's Eulophia clavicornis

Casper's Eulophia angolensis

Polystachya anceps

Bradley's Mystacidium capense

Lastly, I have included a few images of my flowering Cyrtorchis chailuana. I have been looking forward to these flowers for a while and they are heavily scented in the evening to attract hawk moths. I have selfed a few and have two pods developing. Bradley was kind enough to give me some Angraecum eberneum pollen to use in hybridisation but none of these took unfortunately.

Cyrtorchis chailuana