I grew up long ago
surrounded by orchids. My Dad built a greenhouse onto our house in Niagara Falls, NY and heated it by opening the living room door in the winter. When the sun shown, he exhausted the waste heat into the garage next to the GH. He grew all sorts of "floofy" orchids, mostly Cats as well as a number of other tropical plants. I spent many afternoons and evenings helping him with the plants, watering, fertilizing, etc. I gained all of my early knowledge from these 15+ years. When we got married, my wife and I purchased a couple orchids (can't remember where - but they weren't for sale in grocery stores back then.) I still have pictures that show the two were hybrid Phals of some sort and sat in an east window. I eventually got into growing Cacti when we moved to the Klamath Basin area of Oregon where orchids are difficult to grow. When we moved to Michigan in 1977 I still had most of my cactus collection (some 200 species) but the light here is not strong enough and the weather way too humid. We were at 4%- in the Oregon Desert and 40-50%+ here. They slowly pooped out and I turned once again to orchids with (you guessed!) another Phal. One grew to several, then I started moving to species plants, mostly miniatures due to space limitations. That's about it.
This orchid addiction
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