A couple of years ago, while at the Hilo Orchid Show, I saw and bought what was labeled as a Den. crystallinum.
I had had one before in AK.
It was one of my favorites:
The one I bought at the Hilo show was a very poor example of Den. crystallinum.
I expressed my disappointment in the plant at the next years show.
Over my protests, he gave me a Den. cretacium [polyanthum] as a peace offering.
It is now mounted on one of the King palms in the colonades along our drive way.
It should be blooming soon.
I subsequently have gone by his greenhouse and have bought $100+ of orchids a couple of times now.
That Den. cretacium was a good investment on his part.
He is quite sinister.
On my last visit, a week or so ago, he gave me a Drac. lotex plant, no doubt trying to entice me away from the larger pendant Dendrobiums.
I hadn't noticed that there was one bud on it until after I had mounted it
That bud had opened:
I am absolutely smitten with it.
I laugh every time I look at it.
But, I still don't see me getting into many of the Dracs, Restreps or other minis.
He does have a lot of Dracs and other minni types.
He also gifted me with a start of one that I had asked about, what used to be called Oncid. ornithorhynchum.
A couple of guys had been checking around and found that it had been known by the wrong name, for decades at least.
It has been renamed, to what I don't remember.
But, it is still ornithorhynchum to me.
I had also had one of these in AK.
The pretty small flowers look like a pink bird in flight and smell like baby powder.
No one seems to be carrying these for sale anymore.
It is used extensively for breeding fragrant Oncids now.
With a bit of luck, I'll have one in bloom in a year or two.