The Devil's Excrement

It’s amazing how every time I think flowering is stopping, something comes up with buds in no time. Evenings have been cool for Caracas (15-17C at the low point every evening which will be good for flowering in a month or two, plants like that very much.

On the top left is a Sobralia Leucoxantha from the Venezuelan Andes. It may look like a Cattleya, but it is anything but one. First of all it is a dirt orchid, the flower comes out and lasts barely one day and other flowers come out later of the top of the same branch,  from the same bud, seuqnetially behind the previous one. On the right is a Cattleya Nobilior from Brazil.

I love this Cirrhopetalum Coralifferum from Asia. It is one inch in diameter and look on the right picture the close up of the detail it has.

On the left Comparettia Macroplectrum from the Andes from Venezuela to peru. Top right, a Phalenopsis which I have had so long I don’t even have a tag for it or remember it’s name.

Two pictures from my very generous Cattleya Gaskelliana Mimi x Aida. These are from two separate plants. This is a large plant with roots outside the pot and some 20 flowers and/or buds total

This hybrid has the name of a flower, but I can’t remember it right now, it’s Lc. and then some common flower name.

Some plants do well in certain places, such as this Lc. Gold Digger that loves my growing conditions. I started with ne plant and now I have six, five of which are currently in flower and I have taken a “group” picture with all of them. The original plant is the one that hangs in the middle. They grow so much that I moved them out of the orchid room to where I have larger plants and they get much more sun, but they seem to love it even more. On the right a close up of Lc. Gold Digger.

On the left a very nice Cattleya Jenmanii Coerulea, this is the first time it flowers, definitely my best Jenmanii coreulea by far. On the right is a very cute Potinara Hoku Gem “Freckles” which spends most of the year in flower.

Lots of flowering again as the weather gets cooler at night in Caracas, I am not talking anything earth shaking, just 15 or 16 Centigrades at 3 AM

Top left: First flowering of a cross between Cattleya Lueddemanniana Mariauxi x Francisco. The flower is huge, absolutely huge, showing the infleunec of the Mariauxi, the best coerulea of the species. Can’t wait next year to see what it does. Top eft: A ver y nice Catlleya lueddemanniana.

Top left, Cattleya Warneri from Brazil, Top Right: Brassavola Dygbiana

This is the first flowering of a Tria Emily Clarkson, it is a tiny thing less than half an in in size.

Eduardo M. sends these beautiful pctures of a Catt;eya Percivaliana and a Vanda Sanderae. Nice, no?

By now flowering should be dying, but somehow it keeps going. Because of other activities I missed showing you quite a few pictures of flowers that have by now wilted. But these are pretty nice.

Above left: Very nice Cattleya Violacea, I love this species but they did not used to do well in my house, then this year they have gone crazy flowering. This one had three flowers. Above right: Cattleya Intermedia from Brazil.

Above left: Dendrobium semifscum x Dendrobium Johanis Above right: Oncidium Splendidum

Last week I posted a picture of the Cattleya Walkeriana semi alba above left, it turns pout the flowers were starting to open and both look fantastic together. To right: Laelia Santa Barbara “Peaches” a hybrid of Laelia Anceps.

Very nice Cattleya Percivaliana (very stinky too!), I love the yellow, shown in close up on the right.

Huge Dendrochilum, I wished it would flower more often than once a year. Top right, Oncidium, I am not sure which one, will check and post name if I find it.

These two flowers are not mine, they are two Phalenopsis from Orquideario Cerro Verde, where I went yesterday.

It has certainly been a strange flowering season, just when things are supposed to slow down, flowering picks up and the plants that I had thought were going to skip flowering are doing it. I could blame the weather or my massive repotting in late July August, but I will never know. In any case, here are six plants, five species and yes, I do own some hybrids, not too many but here is one.

Top left: Blc. Mroning Glory. I usually don’t pick up hybrids but the lip of this flower was stunning. On the right one of my better Cattleya Walkeriana From Brazil.

Top left, this is Cat. Lueddemaniana Clint Mc Dade x Raga, the plant had two flowers but they were both tangled so the sepals were twisted like this flower is on the left. I love the yellow tint in this plant. On the right a ver y nice Cattleya Percivaliana from Venezuela, this is the “Gabriela” vairiety.

On the top left a Laelia Anceps from Mexico and Central America, this is a nice flower, note the flaring, a little small because this plant had almost all of its roots in the air. I repotted it today. On the right Encyclia Cochleata, a very weird looking flower found in many parts of South America.

Flowering seems to be picking up, as my plants seem to have recovered from the wholeslae repotting I did in August. I more flowers than this, but most of the others I ahve shown before.

Top left, very nice Cattleya Percivaliana, a Venezuelan species. This is a firts flowering of a cross bettween the Amarillo Huevo and Sonia species,very nice lip, shape and stinky as usual. On the right another Cattleya Jenmanii Gran Saban x Rosea, also a first flowering, similar to the one I won second prize with three weeks ago.

Top left, a nice Cattelya Walkeriana in terms of color, but small, this is a piece of another plant with bigger flowers, so it must still be getting used to my home. I took a pictrure with drops of water and another one dry, I liked this on more. On the right, a nice Brazilian species, Cattleya Labiata, very intense purple color.

Nice alba hybrid from a plant that is at least 40 years old, no idea what it is.

A few weeks ago, I posted pictures of Coryanthes Speciosa. This week, Eduardo M. sent me these spectacular pictures of two different ones grown by him in his orchid room. Eduardo and his wife have a large collection, with lots of species. The one on the left below is a Coryanthes Verrucolineata, which I believe is from Peru, not Venezuela. The one on the right is a spectacular Coryanthes Alborosea, also from Peru.

Below is a Coryanthes Verrucolineata under attack by Euglossa bees, you can see they are all over the place and how much they are attarcted to the flower.

I thought I had four plants to photograph today, but in one the flowers wilted and the other, a Cattleya Jenmanii that won first prize last year, the flowers had evidence of virus and I had to throw it away. This is a precaution that I tae anytime there are hints of virus when a plnt flowers. So, I only have the two plants below.

Top left a nice Brassovala Nodosa, it has many more flowers which have opened at different stages. This group is the freshest. On the right, Catlleya Jenmanii corelua. As you can see the shape is not the best, itis the coerulea collor which makes this plant special.