Now that The X Files is on Netflix Streaming, I’ve finally immersed myself in this show that I’d heard so much about but never watched. Last night I started the third season and came to the second episode, titled “Paper Clip.” And I was so excited when a scene opened in an orchid greenhouse that I had to pause and take pics so that I could post them here! Click each photo to see a larger version.
It’s a new year, and I’m already thinking about the New York Botanical Garden‘s Orchid Show! I just looked at their website and found out that this year’s show runs from March 5 through April 25, and the theme is “On Broadway.”According to the site, “The lure and lore of orchids and the theater are melded by Tony award-winning set designer Scott Pask and image maker Drew Hodges to evoke the flair and excitement of Broadway.”
Sounds pretty different from the themes of the past two years, which were “Cuba in Flower” and “Brazilian Modern.” To be honest, I don’t really care what the theme is; I just want to go see thousands and thousands of amazing orchids!!
Yikes, I’ve been seriously shirking my orchid blogging duties. I don’t even want to look back and see when I last did an Orchid of the Week blog. Well, because today is the last day of 2010 I figured I should get in one final blog post this year. And I’ve chosen to feature Phalaenopsis amboinensis, one which I have in my personal collection—and mine is beginning to spike!!
This orchid is native to Indonesia and has small, star-shaped waxy blooms with tiger-like striping. Take a look at this specimen (not mine):
I went away for Thanksgiving weekend and returned to find an aphid infestation on the two (somewhat) pricey orchids that I bought at Lowe’s a few weeks ago. MAJOR SAD FACE! It looked like the aphids had started in the Miltonidium and then spread to the Miltassia, and were also beginning to spread to the phal sitting next to them on the mantle. The poor Miltonidium was crawling with them:
I figure the plant must have had a tiny infestation of aphids when I first brought it home that I totally missed, and they just multiplied. I’m really lucky that I had these plants outside of my orchid room, otherwise I’d have a major problem on my hands. The aphids only got to three plants instead of almost thirty. Christ.
The infestation was so bad that, painfully, I threw away the Miltonidium and the Miltassia, pots and all. I REALLY hated doing this, for many reasons, but I thought it was probably my best bet in terms of preventing those little buggers from spreading. So my newest orchids are my latest casualties. Fortunately, the aphids had just barely started in on the phal, so I washed them off of the plant and it seems to be ok. I think I’ll be able to salvage that one.
But in much, much happier news, I discovered this yesterday morning:
The blooms on my Oncidium Twinkle Fragrance Fantasy are FINALLY opening! I first noticed spikes growing on this plant back in mid-August. One of the spikes actually turned brown so I cut it off, but I still have two healthy looking spikes, this one with only three buds on it. Two of which have now opened and the third is beginning to open.
What I thought was amazing was the speed with which these little blooms opened. By mid-afternoon the buds looked like this:
And then by evening, this is what I found:
Amazing, isn’t it? This *almost* makes up for the loss of my two gorgeous orchids. I wonder why this one spike is only putting out three flowers…when I bought this Oncidium last year at Trader Joe’s, it had a one spike and with LOTS of flowers. It looks like the second spike on this plant will produce more than three blooms, though, so that’s good.
So, nice job, Oncidium! And, RIP Miltonidium and Miltassia. SUCK IT, aphids. I hate you. 🙁
Whoops…I forgot to do an Orchid of the Week post last Friday. For shame!
After my Lowe’s orchid shopping extravaganza last week, I’ve been waiting with bated breath for my new tolumnia’s blooms to open. I did my regular Sunday morning orchid watering session yesterday and noticed that one of the buds was starting to open!
And this morning, I got up to discover the fully opened, gorgeous bloom:
How beautiful is that?? A couple of the other buds are beginning to open, so in the next few days I’ll have several little beauties. Woohoo!!
Also on the Woohoo!! front, I noticed that yet ANOTHER one of my phals is starting to put out a spike. I guess phal blooming season is coming up—they do generally bloom in the winter. So I currently have three phals that are throwing spikes. The newest one that I discovered is the one that I bought at the Union Square Greenmarket about a year and a half ago. This will already be the second spike that it has put out for me—it spiked and bloomed earlier this year. You can see the very beginning of this orchid’s spike in this image: it’s the small light green bit in the middle:
And just for fun, an updated photo of my peloric phal’s spike:
That’s all for now. So much orchid excitement in my house these days! So many exclamation points are necessary!
Man, I have lots of stuff going on with my orchids. I posted the other day about all kinds of new growth on my orchids. Just today I noticed that one of my Phals is putting out a spike—and it’s not the Phal that I mentioned at the end of my earlier post (I think that growth is really just a root). I had noticed this little nub coming out of the base of the plant and thought it was a root, but only a couple days later it has clearly taken on the form of a spike.
Of course I’m aware of what the burgeoning spike looks like in the below photo. Hello! I’m the one who posts things like Unfortunate Orchid Names…how could I not notice? Don’t worry, this hasn’t turned into a porn blog. 😛
You can see that this new growth is a totally different color from the plant’s roots, which are green. Some of my other orchids’ roots are green but are tipped with reddish-maroon so I didn’t really think anything of this thing when I first saw it. Until today, when I saw the mitten-like form beginning to develop. Then I remembered that the orchid’s spike that it had when I bought it was more of a brownish-red color than a green color like some Phals. See?
So, add another YAY to the round of YAYs for my orchids!!