Phalaenopsis spot: Vanilla planifolia and some other Spring blooms

Thursday, October 14, 2021

Vanilla planifolia and some other Spring blooms

Recently, my Vanilla planifolia flowered for the first time and I have since been hand pollinating the blooms as they open. The flowers actually have a subtle and interestingly spicy fragrance - not quite expected. It grows well here in Queensland and mine is growing on a trellis against a South-facing wall. Length of vine seems to be the thing that is important for flowering, not necessarily age of the plant. My Dendrobium anosmum, D. aphylum and D. lodigesii are all in flower now and look good. The D. lodigesii is due for a good re-pot after flowering and a bit of a tidy up. The Phaius australis recently finished blooming with two tall spikes, the larger reaching almost 2m tall. I have since chopped these up to see if I can develop some growth from the nodes on the stems. I was also pleasantly surprised with my Cymbidium madidum that flowered very well this season. I spent much time watching the native stingless bees pollinating each flower after they had opened. These bees are the native pollinators of this species and systematically pollinated all of the flowers on four long spikes of flowers. The bees are very small and seem to really struggle when the pollinia are attached to their thorax after reversing out of a flower - some try to remove the pollinia with their legs while others simply give up flying between flowers and just crawl to the next one - they seem to have a raw deal. I often wondered what their reward was, since the flowers don't actually produce much nectar inside at all. After watching these bees I noticed that they collect the honeydew, which is high in sugars (and is very sweet), that often accumulates in thick blobs behind the flowers, near the ovary. So, it must be worth it then.