This beautiful Bellara orchid currently in flower, right in the middle of our winter giving a bit of color and texture in our cold and rainy weather.

It’s variety “Tahoma Glacier” and it flowers with huge 3.5 in star-shaped blooms displaying irregular purple spots on creamy white background. It’s quite reliable and stable grower and usually sends a few long flower spikes with as many as 10-15 flowers on each spike. Its one of those hybrids that not very fussy and flowers year after year, displaying it’s relaxed large flowers, all facing different directions. One of course can stake them to present more pleasing to the eye arrangement, but I always love to see them growing in their natural way and let it find it’s own natural positions.

It likes a being warmer in colder months and quite happy to grow under the shade of the trees in summer. It likes heavy watering during our hotter months and reduced moisture during autumn and winters.

My plant is a few years old and each spring, after its flowering I divide it and give some to friends so that they too can grow this beautiful orchid and to appreciate it’s huge flamboyant blooms in the middle of winter.

Here in AU we are in the beginning of winter with cold and rainy weather, at times experiencing strong icy winds from Antarctica and our beautiful and lush tropical gardens look a bit muted, waiting for a spring time when a new growing cycle will start it’s magic in our part of the world, however it’s great anticipation time for orchids growers and collectors since Cattleya orchids are in flower at the moment, giving us much needed color infusions.

My Cattleya’s just started flowering and with the names like “Sweet Valentine”, “Tokyo Girl”, “My Blue Heaven”, “Firewalker”, “Pink Angel” – who can resist these flamboyant beauties!

Cattleya’s are one of the most popular orchids with orchid hobbyists as well as the general gardeners and these days have many spectacular varieties and forms. They are the easiest of all orchids to grow, being very tolerant of poor conditions and neglect.

This species are widespread in the American tropics, mainly in costal Brazil and the Andes. There is also significant Cattleya occurrences in Mexico and other Central American countries.

These orchids are quite easy to grow and in our climate need light shade during summer, lot’s and lot’s of water during hottest part of the year and a bit of a shelter during colder months. They are quite forgiving plants and store their energy in large bulbs, which means that even inexperienced orchid novice will be able to grow them, since they recover very quickly from any neglect.

Right at this moment it’s raining quite heavily outside, cold with strong winds sweeping everywhere, dark clouds with a bit of thunder somewhere close – I am off to the greenhouse for much needed color therapy with my Cattleya’s and their magical blooms!

Here is another one of my interesting orchids that just finished flowering – it’s Wilsonara “Tiger Brew” and again, it’s intergeneric hybrid between oncidium, odontoglossum and cochlioda.

It have large yellow blooms with many different burgundy color markings with each flower seems to have different patterns. The flower spikes are long and cascading, with each flower opening at different times.

This orchid have a bit of an “attitude” – it’s not easy to bring it to flower since it’s very particular in regards to light requirements – too much and it dry out and goes all yellow and with not enough light it will not develop flower spikes, so it’s constantly moving around greenhouse in the hope of the ideal conditions. It also likes warmer growing conditions, a lot of air movement, wet and dry cycle which can be a challenge even to an experienced orchid grower.

Still, each flowering season it’s a waiting game to see if “Tiger Brew” will reward me with it’s special and unusual blooms, and when it does, everything is forgotten – just huge appreciation and enjoyment of it’s unusual and magical blooms.

This beautiful orchid from my collection is one of the interesting hybrids from the orchid world – it’s intergeneric hybrid between Miltonia, Brassia, Cochlioda and Odontoglossums and it’s currently in flower.

The blooms are really quite large and spectacular and the color is purple-grape tones with many interesting white markings on the petals. The flower spikes are quite long with about 6 to 8 very large flowers, all seems to maturing and opening at different times, giving extending flowering time.

I’ve had this orchid a few years now and while it’s not difficult to cultivate, it does have it’s own specific requirements – it’s rather sensitive to strong light and prefers shadier situations either in greenhouse or under the trees, especially in summer. It likes a lot of watering while new lives and flower spikes maturing, following by drier cycles, it likes to be warmer in our winter months with a lot’s of air circulating around it.

When growing conditions are perfect, it would flower twice a year – in mid autumn as now and in mid spring, showing off it’s spectacular huge purple flowers that lasts for about 6 weeks.

This is one of the orchids that can present quite a challenge and beautiful discovery rewards to an orchids lover, but when all elements come together in a growing cycle, it shows it’s magnificent, special blooms.

The Lycaste genus currently contains about 45 different species and in nature can be found growing in the areas from Mexico to Peru in hight altitudes.

They have oval pseudobulbs, usually crowded, with a couple of pleated leaves and Lycaste orchids mostly deciduous during flowering. The flowers come up from the bases of the pseudobulbs and and bear a single, large, waxy flower that lasts for about 3 weeks.

Many interesting hybrids have been created between this species and breeders aim to create plants with large flowers, good color and nice scents.

My Lycaste orchid is a cross between Lycaste skinneri “Apollo” and Lycaste skinneri “Adonis” and rather a “collecor’s item”, since not many of them currently in cultivation. I purchased a small seedling of this cross couple of years ago and this is a first time it’s flowering for me. The breeder was aiming to produce bold, large, pristine white flowers and it does not dissapoint – it’s quite spectacular! The plant produced only two flowers at this stage, but they are big, beautiful with a strong scent of jasmine and I am looking forward for this plant to mature and to grow many more of it’s blooms.

Lycaste skinneri is the national flower of Guatemala and this orchid is one of the popular members of this genus, usually flowering with lovely pale pink flowers – by crossing “Apollo” and “Adonis” the breeder achieved pure, pristine white form that’s very pleasing to the eye.

These orchids are not difficult to cultivate, providing some specific requirements met – they have very fine roots and need fine drainage, they like to be underpoted , love a lot of watering while they actively growing and not much moisture when plants go through resting period. Air movement also important and they prefer filtered light.

Lycaste orchids are great addition to any orchid collection – they all have beautiful flowers, nice scents, prolific flowering once matured, producing long-lasting exiting displays.

For nine days in February Tokyo Dome welcomed more than 400,000 visitors, exhibitors from 19 countries and over 100,000 orchids displays. This year the theme of JGP was – “Orchids: Cordial Hospitality – Saying it with Orchids” suggesting how to enjoy orchids in daily life.

This orchid show is where visitors can look, touch, learn, talk to the experts, bring their own plants for evaluation, listen to presentations and communicate with many orchid lovers.

Some of the rarest, never previously seen by general public, Japanese orchids was also displayed at that show – for instance, extremely rare Cypripedium native orchid from Rebun Island was exhibited and was replanted back to it’s natural habitat after festival finished.

There are many judging competitions and many many awards given at JGP – for Individual plant, for best Fragrance, for best Display, for best Flower Arrangement ( interior decorations, gifts, bouquets), for Arts and Crafts (painting, botanical art, photographs, art flower, pressed flower, dried flower) and Miniature Orchid Garden. Also, sales area with more than 130 vendors from all over the world sell orchid plants and other orchids related items.

I’ve been to JGP three years ago and took back with me the most fondest memories – the sheer size of exhibits, the variety of plants, the knowledge and the kaleidoscope of colors, scents and textures, the dedication and selfless sharing of techniques and information, made many contacts with orchid lovers and collectors.

What more can one say – its Orchids and they doing their magic – they unite people from many countries, backgrounds in appreciation and celebration of beauty and love.

Below is a small video featuring JGP 2010 orchid show

Oncidium orchids considered one of the largest genera in the orchids family and many orchid collectors dedicate large portion of their collections to these beautiful and diverse plants.

There have been many name changes in the Oncidium alliance and being such a large genus ( currently approx 750 varieties) one feels that it will be some time before a stable nomenclature is achieved. There are also many hundreds of handsome hybrids made within the species of this genus and with other closely related genera.

This of course, does not deter orchid growers from enjoying such a beautiful blooms and it gives one possibility of growing them in many colors, textures and scents.

My oncidium orchid is var varicosum and it’s one of the first orchids in my collection that starts it’s flowering in early autumn and will continue producing it’s beautiful, bright yellow blooms for a number of weeks. This species native to Brazil and Bolivia and it flowers in nice clusters. The flower spikes come up from the base of the pseudobulbs and are approx 80 cm long. It likes growing in a free-drain orchid compost in the shade of the trees with a lot of air movement around them. They are easy to grow and because of their cascading flower spikes can be grown in hanging pots or mounted on the tree trunks or slabs.

Not many people know that Vanilla is actually an orchid – in fact it’s one of the oldest surviving “primitive” orchids, the origins of which date back- give or take- 120 million years.

This orchid can be found in many tropical regions of the world and this distribution supports the theory that genus Vanilla is very ancient and these orchids display a number of archaic features. The scientists established that origins of Vanilla orchid go back to the time when Gondwanaland broke up some 120 million years ago. They base their finding on the theory of plate tectonics and trace the origin of this orchid to the very beginning of the Cretaceous period, or 120 – 130 million year ago.

Difficult to imagine, I know, such a time-frame, and even more humbling to see the plant that kept all of it’s genetic imprints intact through Earth’s history and evolution and still contributing it’s ancient, bold, uncompromising, unchanged energy to our modern times.

There are a number of species contained within this genus and they occur throughout the tropics. The most known are Vanilla planifolia that grows in Asia and Americas and Vanilla polylepis from Africa – in Angola, Zaire, Kenya. The plant mostly farmed for the vanilla essence that is made from seed pods and plants grow as vines that often reach more than 100ft long.

I always wanted to see this orchid growing in it’s natural habitat and to experience myself it’s special energy, to see how it’s pollinated by native birds and see how it adapted to our “modern” culture and a couple of years ago had an opportunity to visit Lifou island in New Caledonia – one of the biggest Vanilla plantations in the Pacific.

Lifou island is part of the Loyalty islands – it’s beautiful and pristine paradise with clear waters and streams and waterfalls, abundance of wildlife and magical tropical birds, unusual, ancient plants with huge Vanilla plantation where this orchid grows in it’s natural habitat. Native people are very friendly and hospitable and very much tuned to nature, seasons, tides, healing plants and living in tune with all life around them. They plant and harvest and gather by Moon and by stars and I was fortunate to visit an elder of the village, who was a woman, so wise and so humble.

The Vanilla orchids grow through all the island – huge vines everywhere and I was taken through different stages of producing vanilla beans – from planting, to growing to maturing to harvesting and then drying. Few times a year huge ships come to the island to collect the beans and take them all over the world, to be used in so many different ways in our modern living.

So, here it is – a humble Vanilla orchid, as old as the “time” itself, being grown by Native people all over the world who respect it’s origin and it’s destiny and it’s place in our everyday lives. If ever opportunity presents itself for you to visit Vanilla plantation anywhere in the world, be it Mexico or South America or Pacific or Africa – take the chance, you’ll be amazed at the knowledge you will take with you.

This is another Zygopetalum orchid from my collection, currently in flower. It’s variety “Port Vincent” and it have beautiful two-tone blooms. The petals are rich velvety dark brown color and the lip slightly curly velvety purple color.

These orchids are mainly sub-tropical to warm temperature growers and can take quite a bit of heat, which is perfect for our summer climate. They love growing in the shade with lot’s of air movement and the shadiest part of my garden ideal place for them. They like a bit of moisture , but dislike being wet for a long period and require liberal, heavy watering followed by being almost dry before being watered again.

In AU, we have number of innovative Zygo orchid breeders and new beautiful and striking varieties appearing all the time, giving immense pleasure to orchid collectors. Thankfully, many breeding lines have kept the unmistaken Zygo scents. “Port Vincent” variety have main jasmine like scent with undertones of honeysuckle – very enjoyable combination that lingers around the garden for a long time.

If you live in sub-tropical or warmer climate and have shady spot in the garden or a balcony or a covered situation – give Zygo’s a go, they are easy to grow, will reward you with striking blooms and scent and will show you a magic of orchids and they way it brings people together from such different backgrounds to share their love of these beautiful plants.

This beautiful cymbidium orchid called “Blooming Early “Autumn Mist” and it’s just finished flowering in my garden.

I did not expect it to flower at this time of the year – we are now right in the middle of summer with hot dry days followed by cool rainy weather. Couple of weeks ago we had a lot of rains and this orchid started sending one flower spike, very unusual, since majority of cymbidiums in our climate cool flowering plants. Somehow, it must of got confused with the seasons, I can understand , since at times I am also confused with our weather and plants seems to find their own optimum times for flowering.

It’s nice to see and to smell beautiful flowering orchid and this one does not disappoint. It’s parentage Stanley Parkinson x Winter Wonder and the color is very pleasing light apricot with pink dotted centre with some pink dots on the petals. Another beautiful addition to any orchid collection.