The Variegated Thumb

Dendrobium Christmas gift

This Dendrobium orchid has a total of about 25 buds born on two stems - about 8 of those still closed.  The color of the petals is pale yellow and almost green.  There is a new book out from my favorite plant-book publisher, Timber Press, called Green Flowers.  In a way, green is the most boring color that a flower can be, since the majority of plant material is green.  It just blends into the background, part of the noise that nature can sometimes be.  We tend to gravitate towards the colorful spotlights of red, pink, purple and yellow, which readily stand out on all shades of green foliage.  And it’s not just us - insects are attracted to these colors.  What to us says “beauty” says “food” to many creatures.

Dendrobium blooms

But there is a simple beauty to the green flowers.  Maybe the texture and shapes are better observed when the color doesn’t trump the senses.  The pearly sheen that is unique to orchid flower petals stands out on this flower.  There is also a really subtle hint of red on the inner part of the flower, that I pretend is there just to reward those who take the time to look closely.

Dendrobium bloom detail

This particular orchid had a generic “Dendrobium” tag on the stem and a specific tag with hybrid identification in the pot.  Unfortunately, the tag was snapped in half and all I have is a couple of letters - not enough for me to have figured it out yet.  But I’ll keep trying, out of sheer curiosity.  I don’t really need to know anything more than the genus for this particular orchid, in order to take good care of it.

The week before Thanksgiving I added about 15 new plants to my collection.  That’s the mark of a good week, in my opinion!

The smallest of the plants I received - Vanilla planifolia, the vanilla orchid.

Alocasia brancifolia

It started off when I received a box of five very small starter plants I had purchased on eBay: Vanilla planifolia (Vanilla Orchid), Olea europaea (Olive Tree), Alocasia ‘Aurora’ (Pink Stem Elephant Ear), Alocasia brancifolia, and Alocasia ‘Stingray.’  The Vanilla orchid is the actual plant from which the vanilla bean grows and vanilla extract is taken.  I don’t expect to be harvesting from my plant, as I hear it is quite hard to even get them to bloom in cultivation.

Olea europea - common Olive Tree

The same is true for the olive tree I ordered.  I just love the look of the olive tree, though.  I am hoping to grow it to a nice specimen size that I can keep in a large pot.

Alocasia 'Stingray'

Amydrium zippelianum

Next, I received two plants from a friend who collects rare Aroids: Amydrium zippelianum and Philodendron tortum.  These are two really cool plants!  The tortum looks like a palm tree, but what would be a frond of many leaves on a palm tree is actually just one leaf on this Philodendron.  The leaves are just very deeply lobed.

Philodendron tortum

On the Saturday preceding Thanksgiving was the first meeting of the MidAmerica chapter of the International Aroid Society, a group which I have been forming and coordinating.  I’ll post more about that event in the next week.  Two members that came to that meeting brought cuttings and plants to share.  Steve Lucas brought me cuttings of Philodendron camposportoanum, Philodendron billietiae, Philodendron bipennifolium, Philodendron verrucosum, and an unknown Philodendron.

Philodendron camposportoanum

Philodendron bipennifolium

Philodendron verrucosum

Dr. Tom Croat brought small specimens from plants he collected in the wild in Central America: Anthurium holmnielsenii, Anthurium sparreorum and Anthurium verapazense.  These plants are very unique, because they have their assession numbers on the tag, which allows me to search the Tropicos database to see exactly where Dr. Croat collected these plants and what notes he took about the environment where he found them growing.

Philodendron NOID

Dr. Croat looked at the unidentified cutting above, trying to determine at least what genus the plant belonged to.  After tearing the leaf at one point, he noticed what appeared to be fibers at the edges of the tear.  He explained that in Monsteroid plants, there are silicate crystals inside the leaves.  This could mean the plant was from the Monsteroids.  However, after a couple of minutes, the fibers that looked like silicate crystals began to droop, indicating that they were not crystals, but actually just latex.  This indicates that the mystery plant is from the Philodendron genus.

It was a wonderful weekend that resulted in lots of potting!

On vacation last week, I took a couple of books with me - both having plants as their main subject.  One book was a field guide to plants and trees in Hawaii.  It proved very handy in identifying much of the plant life along side the road - plants that aren’t found growing in Oklahoma, outdoors or in greenhouses.

The other book is a non-fiction novel called The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean.  (I always want to put an “s” at the end of her last name.)  The story revolves around an Orchid fanatic in south Florida that has stolen some rare Orchids from a protected nature preserve with a plan to clone them and make lots of money.  The author does a wonderful job of pulling in the reader from the first couple of sentences.  I loved the descriptions of this character that I could vividly picture and felt like I knew.  I also loved the portrayal of south Florida, which is unlike any other area I have visited.

It was a really fun read for my trip to Hawaii, too.  Even though the scenery is very different from Florida, I was getting to enjoy orchids growing outdoors in natural settings while reading this book.

There are lots of deviations from the story (which I enjoyed).  Many of these deviations are historical accounts of the Seminole tribes that occupy Florida.  Did you know that they are the one native people who never signed a treaty with the US?  I didn’t.

On the downside, by the time I was 3/4 of the way through the book I kind of started to realize that the book wasn’t really going anywhere.  When you write fiction, you can do something about that.  When you’re a reporter, relaying the true story of a crazy man obsessed with orchids, well…  you can’t.

Anyway, I would thoroughly recommend this book to any plant lover who has at times felt “obsessed” with plants (I am one of them), and especially to those who have a great admiration for Orchids.  It is a fun read and easy to identify with the characters, if you happen to be one of these people.

Last week my wife and I went on vacation to Hawaii.  I wrote two posts before leaving and scheduled them to update while we were gone, so you never even knew I was out.

On our vacation, we were on the “Big” Island (Hawaii Island) for one day, in order to enjoy the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.  Being the plant-obsessed person that I am, I did quite a bit of research before we left to find some plant landmarks to see along the way.  Hawaii is beautiful without having to stop by a botanical garden, but I wanted to make sure we visited a greenhouse or two while we there, as well as the natural roadside beauty I knew we would see.

Along the road from Hilo, Hawaii to the national park is a commercial orchid grower, Akatsuka Orchid Gardens.  I was really excited about stopping by this grower on our drive, because the website said that they have a showroom open during the day where you can view many of their orchids, and that they also allow you to wander around their greenhouses on a self-guided tour.  Frankly, I couldn’t wait to do this!

And I was not disappointed.  Christie was pretty tired the morning that we flew into Hilo, so she leaned back the seat in the rental car and took a little nap while I wandered around snapping pictures of orchids for about 30 minutes or so.  Then she came in and walked around with me for another 30 minutes and helped me pick out the coolest and most affordable two plants to take home with me!

Zygonisia Cynosure 'Blue Birds' - one of the plants I brought home with me.

The color of this Zygo really caught Christie and me both.  We picked out a very healthy looking plant that had about 15 buds on it - none of them open.  By the time we got home (6 days later) there were 5 or 6 buds open.  It is a gorgeous orchid.  Like nearly all orchids in captivity, it is a hybrid.  This particular orchid is an intergeneric hybrid, which means it is a cross between two different genera - Zygopetalum and Aganisia.

Group of Masdevallias. I took home a Masdevallia velifera x. deformis, which is one of the plants in the left center, with clumps of smaller and darker leaves.

The other plant I purchased is hard to pick out in this image.  It is one of the smaller plants, with darker leaves in the left half of the image, but near the center.  The blooms are born on shorter stalks than most of the blooms in the image, but they look much the same.  It is an interspecific hybrid, which means that it was created by crossing two species within the same genus - Masdevallia velifera and Masdevallia deformis.

The rest of my pictures can be found in this album.  Enjoy!

I have had some success with Orchids in the past, but I have not kept any Orchids lately.  That was until I went to the Orchid Show and Sale at the Fort Worth Botanic Gardens last weekend!

The Orchid Show was nice, but the real excitement came in the sale room, which was packed with orchids of various sizes, colors and price ranges.  My wife agreed with me that the sale room was much more fun, just knowing that you could take any of them home with you, assuming you had the money.

Phalaenopsis bastianii - birthday gift for my green-thumbed granddad who has recently started growing orchids.

But you didn’t have to be a millionaire to walk away with a nice plant.  There were quite a few plants available in the $10-15 price range and very few plants more than $25.  We did see that a couple of the largest and rarest specimens had price tags around $75.

There were orchid seedlings for only $4 each!  Assuming you can keep the orchid alive for a year or two, this is a great deal.  I bought myself a miniature orchid that was in bloom, as well as 3 seedlings.

Tolumnia 'Genting Volcano'

Tolumnia 'Genting Volcano' pot with quarter for size comparison

The miniature orchid appealed to me on several different levels.  It is cool just because it is “full-grown” and still so small, housed in a 1″ diameter pot.  I didn’t even realize they made pots that small!  It also has a great inflorescence.  This particular plant is Tolumnia ‘Genting Volcano.’  The Tolumnia genus is a section of what was once considered the Oncidium genus.  Oncidium was a very large genus and some plants were removed in 1986 and placed in the new genus Tolumnia.  Oncidium is one of the most recognizable genera of the Orchid family, containing the plants which are commonly called “Dancing Ladies” and “Sherry Baby,” which is known for its fragrance of vanilla chocolate.  I had heard about this smell before, but not witnessed it until the sale.  It is amazing how much it smells like chocolate.

Three orchid seedlings: Vandopsis parishii v. Mariottiana, Phalaenopsis stuartiana, Dendrobium alexanderae

When I realized you could buy seedlings for $4, I started reading all of the tags, which were labeled with the genus and species, as well as the color of blooms.  I picked out one seedling from the common genus Phaelenopsis which had variegated foliage.  I also chose a Dendrobium and a Vandopsis.

My simple 8 gallon Orchidarium, including a variegated Maranta in the lower left.

I have set up an “Orchidarium” in a 10 gallon aquarium that I had on hand.  By putting these plants inside the aquarium, there is an increased local humidity that suits these plants well.  A small amount of water is kept in the bottom of the aquarium, at or below the gravel level.  A lid is not necessary and would inhibit air circulation, which can instigate problems with pests and fungi.

Eventually I will add some things to the orchidarium to make it look more natural and hide the pots - some driftwood, pieces of bark and sphagnum moss, probably.

Right now I have a couple of Marantas living in there with the orchids, which help to hide the pots.  They also enjoy the elevated humidity.  I pulled the red-veined Maranta out for the picture so that you could see the setup a little better.

What do you think of my new orchids?