Beautiful flower! I didn't know he hybridized both. I've always admired orchids but never owned any -- I seem to kill off anything that's required to live indoors.

Lovely! My sister used to live near the Missouri Botanical Gardens (she worked for the Missouri Historical Society and used to go have lunch at the garden and wander through their orchid house). She sent me some wonderful pictures of their orchids. She has a few orchids of her own at home now. I don't dare start another plant interest, even though I think orchids are interesting plants. With two kids and three cats, my indoor plant space is seriously limited.

Thanks for sharing that picture!

Laurel

Wow, Brooke! That's gorgeous!

I heard Frank Smith speak last Sat night in Richmond (RADS dinner). Not to be repetitve (posted about in on Daves, so don't know who also goes there), but he acknowledged that he is actually better known for his orchids...around the world!

One thing he said I had meant to ask you/tell you...whatever...you probably already know this...he said he prefers scape conversions. He doesn't kill any plants and always gets some good tet pollen to use. I thought of you when he said this as I remember reading that your hubby does some of the conversion stuff.

Okay, this is not even in the same league as your most marvelous orchid...but it is blooming and this is a first for me, second time this year! Woohoo! It usually blooms once a year for me, usually in January....guess it won't now...it has been in bloom for over a month now...but it is pretty nice right now for a rather ordinary dendrobium:

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Brooke, I like it. Very nice! Thanks for showing the picture.

GG, I am not a member at Dave's, so enjoyed your comments. Also, enjoyed the picture.

Royce

WOW gone - there is no such thing as ordinary in the orchid world. Your dend is gorgeous and I hope my NOID dends I bought from the SAVE ME rack bloom so well. I kept saying for $5, why not. I have two dends and two oncids that I have no clue what they will look like but three rescues are growing like crazy so I hope for blooms. One of the oncids has finally grown a new baby pseudobulb but I this rate, it may not bloom in my lifetime - lol! Are the rest of those pictured phals?

It appears most of hubby's conversions are scape conversion because on future bloom they are reverting back to dips. We have five seedlings that should bloom next year and it will be fun to see what they are. This year I think we got a total of two seeds from conversion attempts. Since it was a bad pod setting summer, we don't know until the plants bloom again next year.

Maximus, the nice thing about orchids is you can put them outside in the summer. I used to keep them sitting around the edges of some shade beds but the addition of two kittens this summer made me have to move them onto shelves. All my houseplants kept inside during the summer suffer because I spend so much time outside. During the cold weather, I spend a lot of time with them - during gardening weather those inside suffer.

Frank Smith is VERY well known in the orchid world having created many awarded orchids. You should be able to get on his orchid site from his daylily site or just google Krull-Smith orchids and drool. I wish I had counted how many greenhouses he had at the nursery but quite a few (12/14?) and they are huge. I peaked in and there were orchids everywhere in the one I looked in. I think if you did a square footage comparison, he had as many greenhouses as daylily growing space.

Laurel you are using all of your available space for daylily seedlings! If and when you get more space, maybe you can make room for some orchids. Whenever you move, you need a basement or even better, a greenhouse!

Thanks Royce - it sure is nice to have something pretty and blooming now that it is dreary outside. When the orchids bloom, I bring them to the house and enjoy them in the computer room. It is the only window in the house with enough light to keep them going.

Here are the rest blooming now - some of these have been blooming for over two months.

{{gwi:636250}} NOID phal - $5 rescue plant

{{gwi:636252}} P. Wedding Promenade - another $5 rescue

{{gwi:636254}} Paph - seedling

{{gwi:636256}} Lycaste deppi - species which is deciduous during the winter.

Brooke

Oh, I love those pictures! You have the touch! My neighbor does orchid rescues and he is a wonder! He has a greenhouse and brings the ones in bloom into his house...then back out again when they're done.

Lol...good eyes, Brooke! I am, however, orchid-challenged, shall we say. My faithful one above has been with me a long time, but I don't know why...lol. It sits in a chair behind my computer...has for years...and I'm not moving it!! The phal you saw is my other faithful orchid...although it has never bloomed (years now!) again....except now, I am getting a scape! Who knows why (certainly not me!)

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I do have one other phal, but who knows for how long...lol...I hope it makes it.

This one I can take no credit for. I probably mentioned this, but I work part time in a Lowe's garden center (to pay for all these daylilies...lol) and I saw this one sitting there. I just had to get it. It would only be tortured to hang around there longer...besides, I got the big 10% off (employee discount).

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Thanks, Royce, and since I do not lack for words (!), I will start a new thread and blab about what I heard Frank Smith say.

Most orchids need a cool down in the fall to initiate spikes. Again, most orchids also want a 10-15 degree temp swing at night year round. I didn't know this about my first orchid but lucked into putting it in the plant growing building in the fall and it got what it needed. In the beginning I thought they had to stay warm year round.

Congrats on rescuing the den - I also rescued two from my Lowes too but they are the ones that are just sitting there. When I repotted them, most of the roots were rotted and I only ended up with a few live roots. Oh well, I have nothing else to do in the winter but watch roots grow.

Brooke

BEAUTIFUL BROOKE! I am like Chris....NO INDOOR PLANTS....I kill them every time! Did you know a fellow gardenwebber used to hybridize orchids? Yep, our very own YUGO! Here is an excerpt from one of his emails to me.....
My hobby was hybridizing big orchids called cattleyas and Phalaenopsis or moth flower.

The email was quite long and very interesting reading taking years from cross to first bloom!
THANKS for BRIGHTENING THIS GLOOMY DAY!
Nancy

I would love for Yugo to jump in here and explain how orchids are registered. I have been trying to figure the whole registration thing goes. It is very confusing compared to how daylilies and hosta are registered.

If you will note on the Frank Smith orchid, the name is listed out of two plants, but these are not registered plants, just the cross name. The pollen parent is Goldenzelle but in researching this, Goldenzelle has been used heavily in breeding but some of them will be Goldenzelle 'another name here' and I can find several different other names following the Goldenzelle.

To get even more confusing, "I think" if I exhibit the above plant and it wins an award, I, not the breeder, would be able to add my own name to it and register it.

Again I am confused because when a plant is grown from seed, all of the resulting plants will have the same name but like daylilies, would be slightly different but still have the same name.

Paph's cannot be TC'd so they are grown from division, which is slow, or selfed seed. If selfed, are these actually the same plant?

Congrats to Yugo for having the patience to hybridize orchids - if you think it takes patience to grow a daylily seed to bloom, try orchids. You can't just stick orchid seed in dirt, it takes a special medium and very controlled growing conditions. Here's my tip for the day - start at a young age to see the results!

HELP YUGO - this ole lady is confused!

Brooke, I was interested in seeing some of Frank's orchids and so I did asked to go though the orchid greenhouses. I was told that May is the wrong time of the year for them to be blooming in the greenhouses. His catalogue on orchids was amazing. I could not believe the variety.
I hope to be able to make it to Mecca again next year, hope to see you there.Twila

Twila if you can talk my hubby into staying home and letting me go back again, I would love to see you there. Unfortunately, he thinks he wants to go. I guess I gushed too much about every place I visited - drats.

My goal for his trip is too not only get some great daylilies but also to raid the greenhouses at Frank Smith's place. Sure hope I get his orchid catalog this year too.

Brooke

Gee Brooke, your hubby gets to go to Mecca and the National??? There must be some psychology at work here that you have not 'fessed up to yet.

BTW, haven't been posting much, but have enjoyed the posts and especially the pictures. If you have more Orchid pics, would love to see them. I went to the garden section of Home Depot Monday, but kept my eyes on the aisles while passing the plants. I think the orchids are beautiful, but I dare not get interested in another hobby.

Royce

Oh Royce, you can't have too many hobbies - remember my favorite saying - it keeps me off the streets and out of the bars - lol! Shame on you for not even looking, you live in a great area to have orchids outside for more months than inside.

Hubby gets to go to Mecca this year but I did it two years ago and going to the National, or even the Regional, is not my thing. I am going to the hosta national this year and I still get out for a dog show or two a year.

I will have more pics in a day or two but have kept hubby too busy to get out the camera today. He is building another light rack for me because oops, brought more orchids home yesterday from a man in Cincy quitting the hobby. A very nice man is cutting down on his collection - he has been growing orchids, and even hybridized some, since 1957. I knew when we went to the orchid show up there Saturday I would bring a couple of new plants home, which I did, but hubby talked to the man for a long time and insisted we go back up and help him cut down on his plants. Now how nice was that! Half of the new plants are your favorites - catts.

Brooke