https://www.atlasobscura.com/a...

Excellent history about orchid breeding!

Wonderful article! Thanks for posting it!!

A very nice read. Thanks.

Jim

That was interesting. But I wonder about the flasks they show with plants inside- it looks like there's a 'ship in a bottle' thing going on..too big to ever get out without breaking.

At the last show here one of the new Asian vendors was selling flasks as well as tiny potted seedlings and bare root. First time I had ever seen one. I did not buy from him. I have enough trouble with blooming size orchids.

I saw those as well, Carol. And thought the same thing. Plus how long do I have to wait for a bloom?

Probably longer that I'll live!
By the way, have you heard the latest name for our weather? Whiplash. Chance of showers tonight, tomorrow, then the SA winds come and suck all moisture out of the air and the red flags go up...again.

Average time for a seedling to bloom from a flask:
Cattleyas(standard) 7-10 years
Cattleya(compact)5-7 years
Phalaenopsis can be as short as 2 years, average time is 3 or 4 years!
All of these estimates are subject to location. In Hawaii, SE Asia or Florida, expect faster results. If I was to try growing things from flask here in Michigan, I would expect things to bloom at the top end of the range.
Vandas in Thailand for example grow much more rapidly so maybe from flask to first flowering could be three years give or take. A dear departed friend of mine used to breed Vandas in Westchestet NY and he would send pods to Thailand. He would visit Thailand every year to check on the progress of his plants. David used to give judges some of his seedlings 2 years from flask and we would see blooms 6 months later! That is because of the incredibly early growth in Thailand.

Trivia question:
Why are Cattleya seedlings typically 5-7 dollars? Phalaenopsis may be cheaper and yet Paphiopedilums and Phragmipediums are starting generally around $15 or maybe even more like $18-25. Any guesses?

Carol. Boomers here last night and still raining. Not hard by any means, but still more than the marine layer mist. Actual steady drops.
Bill, the old supply and demand?

Paphs and Phrags are usually obtained by division? Or should I say they are not mericloned to obtain thousands of babies.

Ursula you are on the right track. They can't be mericloned.
But there is another reason, Cattleya seed pods contains hundreds of thousands of seeds, even millions! But if you make a cross and flask up say, 50,000 seedlings and sell 10,000, the total cost per seedling gets divided by 10,000.
But slippers produce only dozens to a few hundreds of viable seeds. So you take the cost of those flasks and divide it by 25, 50 or even 200, the price goes up from there.
Then we apply Teds' guess, " demand" and the price gets adjusted again.
This is why some crosses the vendors can't even 'give them away'! Everyone has them so nobody wants them. But for the slipper, not everyone has them, they want them to sell but not everyone gets them and the few that they get they sell for mucho dinero!!!

I didn't know there was such a huge difference in the amount of seeds in a pod!

It amazed me when I first heard about it!
I first heard Dr. Norito Hasegawa back in '83 or '84, and he clued me into the typical Paphiopedilum seed pod. He and Koopowitz started "Paphanatics"!

Thanks for posting the link, Rj! An interesting read.

Bill, I'm not surprised the quantity of seeds varies so much across the Orchid family, but I didn't know slippers could produce so few.

BigBill said: Ursula you are on the right track. They can't be mericloned.
But there is another reason, Cattleya seed pods contains hundreds of thousands of seeds, even millions! But if you make a cross and flask up say, 50,000 seedlings and sell 10,000, the total cost per seedling gets divided by 10,000.
But slippers produce only dozens to a few hundreds of viable seeds. So you take the cost of those flasks and divide it by 25, 50 or even 200, the price goes up from there.
Then we apply Teds' guess, " demand" and the price gets adjusted again.
This is why some crosses the vendors can't even 'give them away'! Everyone has them so nobody wants them. But for the slipper, not everyone has them, they want them to sell but not everyone gets them and the few that they get they sell for mucho dinero!!!

Just to resurrect and old post... Paphs also take a "blooming" long time (see what I did there 😉) to go from seeds in a flask to seedling or unflasking size plants, a few years for some and even longer to flower. The average paph flask is usually up over the $100 range for a basic and upwards of a few for some special cross, where a Milt or Onc or Den from seed in to flask smash can for some be 12 months.
Down side to phals, they are HUGE seedlings and usually only have 20 in a flask compared to others who might have 60.
Just opened another lot of flasks last month and put a few seeds off a Den bifalce and a Phal in today. Now the waiting game begins...

Ohhh!! You have a lab set up for germination?!! Please, do tell us more!!

Ursula said: Ohhh!! You have a lab set up for germination?!! Please, do tell us more!!

It's a slow as heck process with a epic learning bellcurve. That's pretty much all there is to it haha. Most orchid growing is dominated by the Thai people especially the phal market. So if you've ambition is to compete with them you'll need a big wallet and a lot of patience and luck 😆

Not to compete, but maybe for the fun of it?