I doesn't appear that I've talked about it in the past, so I'll bring this up now. Patrick Adrichem, the owner of Kingfisher Orchids, and the great man who has provided me with a great majority of my Phalaenopsis, now has his own website! As you probably guessed, it's called Kingfisher Orchids. It is still in the working phase, but it will get better as time passes. Currently he has a bunch of info about things such as flasking, stem propping, and preparing media, and he has pictures of several of his own crosses (with one of my pictures in there!), plus many miscellaneous pictures from his greenhouse. Come spring he plans on keeping a much more regularly updated list of what he has for sale, with something special planned for the early spring, something that all Canadian Phal connoisseurs should look forward to! (Since I am so darn talkative, I am his main mouthpiece to the internet, but I'll seal my lips with that little morsel)
Another great thing is that I am started to get connected with other novelty Phal growers who have some of the same great breeding ideas I do. So, for all of you lucky Canadians, there is potential that I will be regularly receiving stem props and potentially flasks from some friends, so I will be able to grow them out and share a few select seedlings with you! Another exciting thing is that there is great potential that I will soon be moving into colchicine treating my seedlings, hoping to get some great tetraploid novelties to breed with. Depending on how everything works out, one of my currently growing pods could be my first colchicine treated cross. I do plan on treating about 3/4 of each flask with colchicine, and then having the other 1/4 being an untreated, control flask, giving me plants I can be sure are diploid.
Wow, I sure hope everyone enjoys reading, as I wrote quite a lot before even inserting the page break and getting to the pictures!
Today I'm going to start with something unconventional, a Bulbophyllum! Now, dear readers, don't go into shock over the inclusion of a foreign genus into my blog posts! I'll try to keep such incidents at a minimum in the future! (I hope you all know that I occasionally go back and read through my posts. . . laughing the whole time. . . yeah, that's how funny I am!) Anyways, this plant started producing what I thought was a new growth about a month ago, but after reaching about 5" long, I realised that it was way too thin, and must be an inflorescence. Well, it has now definitely proven itself to be an inflorescence, and it has continued to lengthen. Hopefully I will get flowers soon! I don't know too much about Bulbo's (terrible, isn't it, what a tunnel vision growing habit will do!) so there is potential that this thing is a sequential bloomer. Anyways, here is Bulb. caranculatum var. sulawesi!
Now on to another great spike discovery! My little parishii decided to surprise me with an inflorescence, which judging at the size of it when I first noticed, is growing much faster than my sluggish lobbii spikes! I think I'll be remaking Lovely Kid (parishii x lobbii) in the near future.
Wow, I am starting to realise how long it's been since I've updated by looking at the progress this plant has made! My Sogo Vivien is now in beautiful bloom, so I'll be getting some good pictures of it potentially sometime this week. . . or I might wait until the next amboinensis 'Oriental' bud opens up (more on that situation later).
I'm quite excited about this pod on my pallens 'Mellow Yellow', as I was told by the donator of the pollen that the pollen parent is sometimes a finicky breeder. This plant made two new spikes, but it wasn't until it had blasted four buds that I got a flower to open, and I'm really happy this one took the pollen I gave it!
As mentioned before, my teacher bought a new camera over the Christmas break, so here is one of the first pictures I got with it, and I am quite happy and hope to get more skilled with it.
Well, there is once again some paranoia attached with the excitement of a soon to bloom plant. I bought this labelled as cornu-cervi 'Red' before I had an infatuation with cornu-cervi fma. chattaladae (that tidbit is key to my paranoia). Just recently I was reading an older (approx. 2007) article written by someone very knowledgeable about the much coveted cornu-cervi fma. chattaladae. In that article, it talked about how Phalaenopsis cornu-cervi fma. chattaladae is characterised by total flowers that are a complete, solid red, a red that is not achieved through the overlapping of spots and bars, but through simply saturation of all pigment cells. The flowers have no picotee, although there are a few chattaladae that have some green at the extreme tips of the sepals. Anyways, I had read that there are some other forms of cornu-cervi that, through heavily coalesced spots, achieve what appears to be solid red flowers. So, my concern is that my cornu-cervi 'Red' may be a hybrid between fma. chattaladae and one of the other forms. The reason I am so paranoid about this is that I fear that anything but a pure fma. chattaladae may pass on spots in any hybrids made with it, which I am not looking for. I guess I'll be able to tell once the new buds open.
My neon flower making plant, Princess Kaiulani 'Chin Yo' is in the process of making two new spikes, which brings the total to three spikes. I am looking forward to breeding with this, as not only are the flowers pretty large, but they are also very thick, vibrant, and fragrant. The third spike is on the opposite side of the plant as the mature spike is. I have some great plans for this, and if it goes according to plan, we'll have some new neon hybrids coming to Canada soon.
My Rarashati Princess 'Soan Bronze Goddess' is multitasking at the moment, with a great looking pod and two open flowers. It's really amazing at the contrast between this and 'Soan Rustic'. This plant does have much darker colour, yet while this plant is only carrying two flowers on one inflorescence, my 'Soan Rustic' has seven flowers and three buds on three inflorescences. I know this cross in general made by Patrick is pretty awesome, so I may someday do a sib cross between my two.
Once again I am reminded of how long it's been since I updated when I realise my Gelbliber 'Arianne' is almost ready to open its first bud, and the last time I showed it, there were no signs of buds. There are now some spots showing through the bud. Unfortunately, it appears as the bud may open upside down.
My Kingfisher's Princess 'Soan Next Queen' is now showing buds on it's old and new inflorescences, so hopefully I'll soon be able to see this bloom after a long interval of nothing.
Now, I'm slightly ashamed to admit this, but this plant was left to alone to die, without water, until I one day discovered a new branch developing and a whole new inflorescence. I bought this plant with two blooming inflorescences and one branch, and soon afterwards, all three tips ended in kiekis. Unfortunately, the plant became infested with mites, so after saving one kieki, I left the rest of the plant to die. Just yesterday, I noticed that it had some buds on a new branch, so I sprayed the mites, watered it, and it has started to perk up again. There are chances that the plant won't make it after all the damage it has taken, but I will at least take all the pollen it gives me, and try to make a pod or two. Hopefully it gives me another kieki or two, also.
Well, this here is the first mention of a little complex equestris hybrid I bought this last June in Banff, Alberta. This is (Brother Spring Dancer x Sogo Tris), so I think it will be a tetraploid. . . but I'm not sure. Regardless, it should be even. . . I hope! The flowers really do look just like a bigger equestris, and the plant is quite petite, so hopefully it will be of use to me!
My lindenii has always grown with it's crown at a slant, pretty much horizontally, with most of its roots growing vertically, so I decided I would load a cork mount with sphagnum, mount the plant on top, and then put enough sphagnum to cover up all the roots. Now the one new root it has is growing straight up--into the sphagnum! Score one for me!
I nearly jumped out of my skin when I found this I was so excited!!!!! MY JOY SPRING CANARY IS IN SPIKE!!!!!! This is one of the pricey plants in my collection, and I almost lost it to a huge mite infestation it had a year or so ago. Thankfully, the mites seemed to have mysteriously vanished, and the newest leaf is still looking new and not chewed up! To be more clear, this is Joy Spring Canary 'Rainbow World', one of the more colourful Joy Spring Canary that came out of the original cross. I really hope you fellow Canadians like this specific JSC, as I will be breeding with it. . . a lot! One of the things that slightly annoys me is that a lot of breeders are still using Yungho Gelb Canary, a parent of JSC, because they claim YGC is a proven breeder, which it is. However, how will any of the JSC be proven as breeders if everyone uses YGC instead! This seems to be pretty dumb, so I guess I'll be the one to prove if JSC are worth breeding with. And to be honest, with such great parents and almost every plant coming from this cross being amazing, it will be hard to imagine that they are worthless breeders.
On to my Vio Vio! This is one of the plants that I received as a birthday present from three of my awesome orchid friends! It was quite large, yet many of its lower roots were old and shrivelled. In addition, the new roots it was starting were waaaay up on the stem above the older leaves, so I decided to do some harsh pruning. I literally ripped off the older leaves so that there were no leaves between the new roots and the sphagnum. The plant is looking happier than ever, which is testament to the fact that the roots could not keep up with all the leaves it had. This also has a new spike, so I'll be having some more blooms soon!
And my Rarashati Princess 'Soan Rustic' closes today's post with its wonderful display! As mentioned previously, this plant is way more floriferous than 'Soan Bronze Goddess'. I also took the best picture I've taken yet of the roundest flower this plant has given me! For some reason I haven't really done any breeding with it. . . I should probably pollinate one of the flowers when I get home.
Thanks for looking my fellow orchid addicts!
Great and informative website at Kingfisher Orchids. Too bad the catalogue page is empty. I hope there will be some Phal. Kung's Penang Girl plants for sale, really liked the pictures of it.
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