It's Phalaenopsis "Brother Coral" x "Everspring Pearl." And guess what? It's fragrant!! I do like it! Worth the wait!
With orchid crosses like this, people hand-pollinate the flowers with a brush, and when the dustlike seeds form and ripen in the pod, they scatter them on agar (a seaweed derived nutrient medium gel) in a closed flask. When the seeds germinate, they're almost microscopic. The seedlings are grown on in the flask until they're big enough to transplant. You don't really know for sure what you'll get, since some seedlings will have more properties of one parent than the other. Buying seedlings is a bit of a crapshoot, but I like that kind of gamble.
Iwangara 'Appleblossom" is a hybrid cross of Brassaevola, Cattleya, Diacrium (Caularthron) and Laelia orchids. Yes. A quadrigeneric hybrid. This is part of what is so dang cool about orchids. They are man-made, and yet manage to be so beautiful through it all. Someone decides he (or she) likes the growth habit of one, the fragrance of another, the color of another, the form of another, let's say, and crosses the plants and comes up with something unknown in nature, something virtually unnameable. So then they have to come up with a new genus name for this creation. Hence the bizarre genus Iwangara. It has a terrific growth habit, with nice fat pseudobulbs and springy arching paired leaves. And, like most of my others, it's wildly fragrant. Stinks up the room, it does. Ahhhh. In the picture below, you get a hint of that growth habit. Big plant! Has its own pedestal.
For pure bizarreness, it's hard to beat the Paphiopedalums, or slipper orchids. This is Paph. Emerald "Buint Ruby" x Paph. superbens "King." They're the most fun to photograph, with light coming through their petals.
Psychopsis Mendenhall "Hildos."
Since I wrote this post, I found that the bud had swelled and enlarged until it looked like an elf's shoe. Yesterday, I photographed it, but I was troubled by its color--a bit yellow. This morning, I looked closely at the bud again, and touched it oh so gently with a fingertip, whereupon it promptly fell off. Well, isn't that special. You wait since February and watch this thing grow to three feet and you know it only has one flower at a time but that one's a lollapalooza, and the very first bud falls off before it opens. However...there is another bud right beneath the stump of the first one, and I choose to interpret this inauspicious event as the plant trying not to bloom while I'm off giving a talk somewhere. Ahem.
Can I get an ARRRGHHH from the choir? It was my personal Belmont Stakes moment.
7 comments:
Julie,
I admire your orchids so much I went out and bought one and took it to work. It's beautiful in my windowless office. Made of silk.
Mary, who will attempt a live one soon.
Oh Julie, I'm so envious of their beauty and will enjoy your on-line orchids since I can't grow them at my house (too cold & dry in winter, plus Kitty thinks they're a snack!)
ARRGGH! There ya go.
I bought an orchid today. At Kroger. I have no idea what kind it is...it's purplish.
: )
*I missed both of the girls' first teeth. My Mom was watching them both times, and she was the one who discovered them.
There should be a law against children walking or erupted a tooth without their mother present.*
LOL Mary! Best kind!
Thanks for the info Julie. I'll send you a photo of where it was and what it looks like now. I am still proud that it's grown so much and is so much happier. Oh, and I did repot it several months ago as well.
I keep saying I am going to attempt another orchid but after the last one I feel so guilty killing something so beautiful that I may just try Mary's good idea...killing silk is so much harder to do
The first flowering of the Cattleya "Yellow Bird" I have did the same thing...ready to open, it seemed, and suddenly all three buds yellowed and fell off in about 2 days! Drat and double drat! I know what it looks like from internet photos anyway.
Caroline in SD
You probably already know this but don't ever cut the stem off the oncidium as I have had one of these bloom for an entire year on the same stem...
Thanks for sharing.
Phillip
1888Orchids.com
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