Because the Spanish Moss (Spanish Beard/Air Plant) is a Bromeliad...that is why it goes well with your plants.

I went to the Tampa Orchid Club meeting yesterday with 9 bloomers for the show table but won no ribbons. The good news is that I picked up a nice Trichoglottis brachiate, a dark red species from the Philippines. Upon review here this morning, I see it is more correctly called Trgl. atropurpurea with brachiate being called a synonym. It is a large mature plant, about two feet tall and grows like a Vanda.


Jim

Wow! Pretty!

That plant sure look way taller than 2' and looks like a "single-cane" Dendrobium. I love the flowers. Are they fragrant? Does it have rhizome-like growth or simply grows from a single cane? Can it be divided?

P. S. You know I like to ask questions.

That is a beautiful Orchid, Jim. Looks like you got a nice size plant too.

From the basket to the very top is 22 inches and it has another 20 inches of root hanging down. It is monopodial, like a Vanda. There is no spike but rather individual flowers coming off of the stock. There is no way to divide it now as it is a single cane but it may form keikis at the base.

Jim

Have you ever grown one of these, Ursula?

Jim

We overlapped.
yes, I did/do: as follows
And it does keiki, I lost the top of a fairly small, but blooming size plant years ago and that keiki is now slowly trying to reach blooming size again. Hopefully it blooms still in my lifetime.....
And at one of the last shows I also picked up another plant, but not in a long shot as nice and established as yours. I will consider myself lucky, if I might see one bloom this or next year.

Thanks for the reply, Jim. Is guess the background makes it appear much taller.

I am slowly spreading my wings, dabbling in "strange" orchids I have never owned or even known about. I now have:

1. C. leopoldii 'Dark Blood' x C. leopoldii 'Pauwela Leopard'. It is a species from Brazil.
2. C. leopoldii v. vinicolor 'Kathleen' AM/AOS. Another Brazilian species orchid and in sheath.
3. Eurychone rothschildiana. An African species and a sub-compact. Apparently it prefers to grow in a small hanging basket.
4. Max. tenuifolia 'Edna' HCC/AOS. This species plant was a division of a "Mother" plant and has a coconut fragrance.
5. L. perririi 'Big Buggah' AM/AOS. Another Brazilian species.
6. L. superbiens. This species plant hails from Mexico.
7. Bulb. rothschildianum. This is a sub-compact species plant hailing from China. It is a division and prefers to grow mounted on cork (at least that's the way I got it).
8. Encyclia alata. A species found in Mexico and Costa Rica and it is in bloom.
9. Phal. equestris. A species that grows as a subcompact. It is blooming. It apparently grows best in a small hanging basket.
10. C. Brabantiae 'Pink Elephants' x Blc. Sunspots 'Exotic Spots'. This is a hybrid and the flowers are loaded with spots.

All of these plants are blooming size.

If any of you grow these, perhaps you could give me some pointers, if any of them require special treatment.

Laelia superbiens aka Schomburgkia superbiens, around here in NJ it needs full sun to bloom. I don't use any medium, I simply place it into a suitably sized empty clay pot and let the roots adhere to to the pot. Eventually it walks out of the pot and will have long roots hanging down. At this point I hang it from the bar/ hook.
I water it daily.

Btw this is a really nice list, Ken,

I'm trying to the away from (total) cattleya alliance orchids. I just hope I don't kill the majority of them.

Sounds like lots of interesting pictures coming up for us!

The only one on your list I have is the Enc. alata and it's a wonderful, durable and easy bloomer.

I don't know whether this is an easy-to-find plant, but I bought all the grower had and I was only able to get two of those.

Well, I was at Lowe's today, getting some more stakes for the tomatoes, and yup, you guessed it! Stopped by the clearance rack...A beautiful NOID Phal, that surprisingly enough, is in a bark medium instead of the dreaded sphagnum...The roots look amazingly healthy. I'll keep it quarantined for a couple of weeks...but @ $5.00, I couldn't pass it by!

It's a beauty, Tara. Great buy! You might want to drill a few more holes in the pot after it finishes blooming if you're going to let it outside. Air flow around the roots is The Critical Thing for phals.

My Lowe's doesn't put any orchids on the clearance rack until they're finished blooming, and literally all but finished . . .

Good shopping, Tara!

Ken, all are nice orchids and I have several of them. The only advise I can give you is the Bulb. rothschildianum needs to be kept fairly damp or at least don't let it dry out completely. I grow most of my bulbos in moss.

Jim

They did have quite a few itty bitty ones that were finished blooming @ $3.00. But this one caught me by surprise! Only one of its blooms had begun to fade. This came in a plastic pot with good drainage, albeit just in the bottom of the container, and that was sitting in the pot that you see in the pic. That clay pot itself would probably sell for the $5.00 that I spent. I'm thinking that I will carefully add a couple of more slits or holes for better aeration.


Thanks Jim!

Wow, Jim. All these Bulb. roshschildianum plants were mounted on tiny pieces of cork. None of the cork pieces were more than 3x5" and most don't even reach that size. This is the second orchid variety that was mounted on cork that I have received from the grower. I previously asked the grower (on the first batch though a different genera) why cork-mounted, and he said they grow best that way. I just assumed he knew what he was talking about. I have already re-mounted those small mounts on larger pieces of cork, backed by sphagnum moss. The new mounts are anywhere from 5x8" up to 8x12". Now I don't know what to do.

This is where I am now. If you look really close, you will see the original, tiny mounts on one or two of these pictures.

Ken, if that is the way they came, just go with it. I get my bulbos from Bill Thoms, the guy who wrote the book on them and they always come in moss. Since yours are mounted, just be sure you keep them watered well.

Jim