Orchids spring 2008

[Anthony Darby]

I've just been sent these orchid photos, which I thought you'd like to share....
Calypso bulbosa occidentalis ....

I seem to remember a forum member saying these grew like weeds in his garden, even growing on his compost heap. He offered to spread the joy............maybe one day.............?

[Paul T]

The Calypso are stunning.  What a glorious flower.

The Masdevallia hybrid is rather pretty too.  A nice mauvey pink, which is a fairly unusual colour.  M. coccineus itself is such a strong red-orange fiery colour and the hybrids often end up being very bright pinks and oranges etc, so your softer colour is rather nice.    has kept the flower form of coccineus pretty much though.  Is it a tall plant?

[Maggi Young]

The same friend has sent me these photos of the Calypso, too.
He likens them to little fairy faces... and I see  what he means....

[derekb]

Paul the leaves are about 5 inches tall and the flower about 8 inches.

Derek

[Lesley Cox]

The calypso setting is wonderful too. Are these pics taken in the wild Maggi or is it a carefully (and beautifully) constructed nook in someone's garden or shade house?

[Maggi Young]

Lesley asked..

The calypso setting is wonderful too. Are these pics taken in the wild Maggi or is it a carefully (and beautifully) constructed nook in someone's garden or shade house?

I thought my friend had been instrumental in some if this more artistic planting, so I asked him, and so it proved.... here is his reply: 


"They grow on my property, but that being said,  I move them to different locations, especially when putting a path through where they inhabited..The symbiont is obviously in attendance for them to be here in the first place, and they are amenable to my discussing movement with them and it,  and my clustering them together, sometimes in atypical situations such as atop old stumps pictured. They are not  found that way in nature and require that I establish a bit of a planting depth of forest floor medium over the old rotting wood for them to be happy in such a situation. I will photo some more in the next few days as they are just coming into bloom, and they are darlings. Stump settings allow them not to be as easily overlooked although the unappreciative do.
The answer to the question is semi wild I guess, unless you consider their caretaker a wild man of the woods,..then the answer is wild ;-))  "

[Lesley Cox]

Thank you Maggi, and your friend, for this comprehensive and useful reply. Useful because pleiones could benefit from similar planting I should think. When my shadehouse is built (I've been waiting 11 years, probably only another 9 or so to go) I'll try to emulate this.

I like the sound of your wild man too.

You mentioned fairy faces but I think they look very much akin to the original group of travel giraffes that Stellan posted, of the little herd in Peter's garden. They seem to be like miniature pink animals, overlooking their surroundings and waiting for something to sniff at. The petals are almost antler-like. They are in fact, quite adorable.

[Maggi Young]

Thank you Maggi, and your friend, for this comprehensive and useful reply. Useful because pleiones could benefit from similar planting I should think. When my shadehouse is built (I've been waiting 11 years, probably only another 9 or so to go) I'll try to emulate this.

I like the sound of your wild man too.

You mentioned fairy faces but I think they look very much akin to the original group of travel giraffes that Stellan posted, of the little herd in Peter's garden. They seem to be like miniature pink animals, overlooking their surroundings and waiting for something to sniff at. The petals are almost antler-like. They are in fact, quite adorable.

Peter Korn grows Pleiones in a similar situation in his garden... in his case they are planted on huge mossy mounds over rocks, I believe. A very fetching method, that's for sure.


I fondly remember seeing Kath Dryden's exquisite exhibit of Calypso bulbosa, growing with a small wooden stump and moss ( like a small piece of driftwood washed up on the streamside in a wood) at the show of Alpines 1991 at Warwick. Utterly captivating little plants and beautifully presented. It just suited them so well and looked so much nicer than the same plants just sitting in a pot.

[Anthony Darby]

Here's Serapias neglecta flowering today in the greenhouse.

[Paul T]

Nice, Anthony.  Do you have lingua as well?  If so, what do you find to be the differences between them?

[Anthony Darby]

Nice, Anthony.  Do you have lingua as well?  If so, what do you find to be the differences between them?

An order of magnitude Paul. I reckon neglecta flowers are at least five times as big. I have lingua and orientalis. Of the three, lingua are really quite the smallest flowers.

[Paul T]

Anthony,

I had to ask as I have heard conflicting reports as to differences.  Pics I had seen of neglecta showed much broader labellum, but without a size reference there was no way to know size.  I don't know the third species.  I only grow a couple of lingua forms here, never having found a neglecta that wasn't actually a lingua.  I'd assume that there are orchid collectors here though that have the correct species.  Thanks for the info.

[Anthony Darby]

Here is Orchis laxiflora taken on the same day as the Serapias neglecta, which has flowers as big as my thumb Paul.

[Paul T]

Very Cool Anthony.  It is always so hard to tell from a pic how big anything is, so the size reference is a help.  Would love to grow some of these terrestrial orchids and hope to track them down here in Aus one of these years.

[Maggi Young]

I have removed various postings about Cypripedium and moved them to the new Cypripedium thread... see here: http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=1708.msg42950#msg42950