A pollination ?

[LizB88]

I started to water my orchids this morning and notice that my spider orchid has one flower in the middle of the stem looked dry out and shriveled, and it seems to had being pollinated by the many hummingbirds, butterflies, or bees that visit my balcony and this summer the hummingbirds have and butterflies have increased in numbers. Now what do I do with the flowers that have being pollinated. I'm learning how to care for the orchids in my custody, but I don't know what I would do with seeds.

Should I cut the flowers that are pollinated and not let the plant develop the seeds???

[WhiteRabbit]

The rare times I have gotten a seed pod, I just let them be ... but perhaps others may know if a good reason to remove them

[Island Girl]

I think the only reason you might wanna get rid of them, is if the plant is weakened in some way (it can kill the plant, like being over-bloomed)... But other than that, I see no reason to remove them

[pipsxlch]

I always removed them, since I figured they did draw energy from the plant. Shouldn't hurt to leave it on a healthy plant though.

[LizB88]

Thanks everyone, I found today two other plants that have seed pods on them. all of the plants are healthy and can support a growing seeds, I guess it's time for my next orchid challenge, and that is to see if I can get them to mature and them get seedlings.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

I suggest finding out the scientific name, (if it is a species); (if it is a hybrid), the name the breeder registered your "Spider Orchid" as first. You will need this in order to send the seeds to an orchid seed sowing lab for them to sow. I highly recommend you send the seeds to a reputable orchid seed sowing lab in order to sow them, the seeds have very special requirements in order to germinate them, and it will not be as simple as letting the seeds fall in the pot and seeing if they will germinate, because for many types of orchids this will simply not happen. The orchid seed sowing lab must be able to identify what you have in order to know how to sow the seeds properly.

Simply naming the orchid "Spider Orchid" is often times confusing. Although, I have a good idea of which "Spider Orchid" you're talking about, there are at least 2 completely different types of orchids that are generally called "Spider Orchids", and those are:

1. Orchids in the genus Brassia or intergeneric crosses that contain a high amount of orchids in the genus Brassia. These orchids are epiphytes (grow on trees).

2. Orchids in the genus Caladenia - which I doubt you have, because they are not readily available here in the US, and they are pretty difficult to grow. These orchids are terrestrial orchids.

There may be other orchids called "Spider Orchid", so before you send the seeds over to a lab, make sure you get the correct name.

If you don't have a tag with the orchid's name on it, then you can see if you can try to post a pic and see if any of us can ID your plant for you.

To answer your original question, yes, as others have already mentioned, the pods will do no harm to a healthy orchid, so I see no reason to remove them either.

The pods may mature within 1 - 3 months, so keep an eye on them.

There are 2 methods of collecting seed.

1. Collecting the seeds from a freshly open pod.

2. Collecting the seeds from a green pod that is very near busting open.

For seed collecting method #2, what I like to do is this...

If one pod has burst open without you being aware of it, and you know that the other pods started development rather close in time to each other, then you can remove the green pods that haven't burst yet along with the pod that burst open. There is a pretty good bet that the seeds in the green pods are mature enough to be sown.