Aussie native Cymbids

[bitis78]

Hi all,

Just thought I'd share a couple of pics of my Aussie native Cyms with you.

The first is Cymbidium suave, followed by Cymbidium madidum. Both have a delicate fragrance similar to nutmeg.

Enjoy!
Andrew.

[Baz in Oz]

Very nice Andrew! Just to give you a target to aim for, I have seen Cym. madidum growing on Casuarinas in the ranges between Townsville and Ingham at around 200-300m. The entire plants, mixed with some sort of herring bone fern, could be up two 1.5m across and the bulbs up to 200mm long.
I find the perfume just about the sweetest thing you could imagine.
BTW, the flowers looked more like your Cym. suave.

Baz

[bitis78]

Thanks Baz...

At a distance, maybe, but close up, madidum looks very different to suave... As shown in the pic.

Not to mention the morphological differences, which leave nothing to guesswork....

[mjf45322]

Was wondering if you had a extra division to sell and ship to US.
Mike
mjf45322@aol.com

[Andrew]

Hi Andrew,
Do these two normally flower this early in the season in Sydney? Are you providing heat? In Melbourne, the native Cyms still have a couple more months until they flower.

[bitis78]

Hi Andrew,

I live in a quite warm part of Sydney and it is rare here to go even as low as 6C on a Winter night (usually 8 or 9C). That, coupled with the fact that they are hanging under clear fibreglass might account for it.

I often find plants on Ebay from Vic sellers that are being offered in flower long after the same plants in my collection have finished flowering.

Some examples I can think of:

Long finished in my collection for the year are:

D. speciosum, D. kingianum, S. falcatus, R. glauca, and plenty else.

About to flower (normally Summer flowering):

V. tricolor (suavis), R. imschootiana, etc.

Hope this helps,
Andrew.

[smweaver]

Beautiful blooms you have there, Andrew. I've also read (to tag onto Roy's comments) that madidum eventually gets to be huge. Your plant looks almost identical to a madidum hybrid that I have (which is also starting to muscle in on its comparatively smaller cymbidium neighbors in my collection). I like your suave's flowers too, but I think it has a certain amount of notoriety (at least here in the US) for being something of a finicky grower. Do you also grow canaliculatum?

Steve

[bitis78]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the comments! Yes, I also have C. canaliculatum, but unfortunately, it didn't flower for me this year. It had a good flowering last year, but produced new growths which were smaller. I'm keeping a close eye on it this spring/summer, so I can see what I need to do to improve things.

Yes, madidum is genetically very strong as a parent and many of its hybrids take on a lot of madidum's characteristics. It is one BIG plant, too, with very impressively large pseudobulbs. I see the potential in my plant to form a monster specimen rather quickly!

I've not heard of anyone having trouble with C. suave, but then - we in Australia are growing a native plant in its native climate. My plant is growing like a weed and I'm expecting many flower spikes next year. It is definitely a messy grower and I think the plant can look hideous as canes get taller and older, and perhaps the untidy appearance with lots of old dead bits can give the false impression that it might not be doing so well.

Have you tried your hand at any native Cymbids?

Andrew.

[smweaver]

Hello, Andrew. No, I don't have any of your native cymbidiums. I do have a couple of madidum crosses, but not the actual species. Every picture of Cym. madidum that I've seen has looked like my plants, so I can easily see that it must often be quite dominant genetically when it's crossed to other cymbidiums. I would love to find a pure canaliculatum, but it's hard to find over here. And whenever plants are infrequently found for sale, they're the sparkesii variety. I like the "garden variety" that has flowers with greens, browns and yellows instead of the dark red sparkesii blooms, so finding one of those is probably going to be even more difficult for me.

I do, however, have a couple of Australian dendrobiums: D. jonesii (formerly ruppianum) and D. speciosum. My speciosum is supposedly the smaller-growing pedunculatum variety. If that's the case, however, I can only imagine what the standard-sized varieties of this species look like. From what I understand, pedunculatum's a dwarf--but perhaps "dwarf" should only be used in comparison to the other members of its family. My pedunculatum's filling a fourteen-inch (approximately 36 cm) wide pot, and it's making new leads in every direction (five new leads were made this past summer). Since I read that it's a lithophyte, I'm growing it in a mix that's primarily made up of large stones that I collected from a nearby field. So it gives me something of a workout to move it around. But it seems to like this arrangement, as I can see what looks to be about a million roots scrambling over and through the rocks. It's a fabulous plant that blooms every winter for me, and nothing (neither sun nor insects) seems to bother it when I have it outside from spring to fall. I just really wish that I had investigated, in advance, what I was getting into when I bought this plant more than a decade ago. I think I probably just read the words "compact-growing" or "dwarf" in its description and thought that it was maybe going to be something small and bonsai-ish like Neofinetia falcata instead of what's turning out to be a small Volkswagen.

[bitis78]

Hi Steve,

The C. canaliculatum I have is the garden variety. I have attached a pic of last year's flowers. I reckon there has to be an Australian nursery that will export - it's reasonably easy to get over here.

Your experience with D. speciosum makes me laugh. I too have one of the "dwarf" varieties. I bought it as a tiny seedling when I was 7 years old. I'm now 31 and you should see it now. I think your method for it is fantastic and it is little wonder that it's doing so well for you!

Here's my canaliculatum:
Andrew.