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Mar 18, 2022 6:08 PM CST
Name: Big Bill
Livonia Michigan (Zone 6a)
If you need to relax, grow plants!!
Bee Lover Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge) Orchids Region: Michigan Hostas Growing under artificial light
Echinacea Critters Allowed Cat Lover Butterflies Birds Region: United States of America
You may have been snookered! Ripped off. Or threw your money away. You can't germinate orchid seeds the way that you can germinate tomato's or cucumbers.

Daisy is 100% correct in pointing out the ages old association of orchid seeds and mychorrhizal fungi.
You can't use a bark mix or anything like that. A large number of terrestrial orchids that we have here in the states, come from tiny little corms or little bulb like structures. Those sprout at some point in the year and the orchid develops from that. It flowers and dies back to the teeny tiny corm before winter.
Those terrestrial orchids do produce seeds that often fall to the ground but only germinate if a very specific collection of conditions exist. It will nearly impossible to recreate those conditions using an orchid mix, potting soil or peat moss.
Sorry to be such a downer but as an orchid judge, a fellow judge brought this very notion up at an orchid show two weeks ago. He asked, "Has anyone seen these orchid seeds for sale on E-bay?" We all had a good chuckle over it because we all know about orchid seeds and how nearly impossible they are to grow by conventional means.
I mean take a look at a ripe, Cattleya seed pod. It is the size of a small pickle. There could be 2-3 million seeds in the pod. They are the size of a dust particle. When the seed is released and spread by the wind, that pod, 2-3 million seeds, may produce a half dozen seedlings who manage to blow into just the right niche in the crotch of a tree on a crevice in a rock. It is astronomically long odds.

But never the less, good luck.
Orchid lecturer, teacher and judge. Retired Wildlife Biologist. Supervisor of a nature preserve up until I retired.
Last edited by BigBill Mar 18, 2022 6:10 PM Icon for preview

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