Ansellia habitat temperatures

[estación seca]

Thank you! That's what I was looking for. Are they known from some of the Transvaal regions where it gets even hotter?

[ThePinkCucumber]

Basically in SA they are in KwaZulu Natal, bit of Mpumalanga and most of Limpopo, so our north-east (this I found in the new Orchids of South Africa Field Guide by Johnson and Bytebier). All fairly hot. As I mentioned Letaba in my previous post, apparently that is the hottest place in SA with average max. temperature of 35C. That's pretty hot for average temperature. So I'd say about 40C is the highest.

[estación seca]

Thank you for the great information.

[smweaver]

Are you able to provide the plants with a cool winter rest? The plants I have grow like weeds during the summer heat, but the trick to getting them to bloom is giving them a cool (especially at night) and dry dormancy. My plants take winter nights in the low to mid 40s on a regular basis, but they're also allowed to go (and remain) dry for long periods of time. My summer heat (while nothing like what you experience) doesn't bother the plants as long as they're given some shade during the hottest part of the day and watered a lot while actively growing. This is a very hardy species, so it may be fairly adaptable for you. Good luck.

[estación seca]

Thank you. We get overnight winter frost only rarely. I can have it outside protected from rain, and bring it in for the night if necessary. Our winter nights are mostly in the range 35-50 F / 2-10C.

[smweaver]

I would say that if the forecast calls for the night temperature to drop below 40 F, bring it inside. Other than that, it shouldn't require too much pampering. Does anyone else in the Desert Valley Orchid Society grow this species?

On a side note, I am a little jealous of your winter conditions, as it's a challenge for me to keep my cacti happy at this time of year. I usually end up placing them in the unheated garage for their winter dormancy, as that's the only way I'll see flowers in the spring.

[estación seca]

Thanks. I'll ask but most people are always looking for smaller plants.

When I lived in St Louis, one winter I put the C&S in the basement. I set up a high-intensity sodium lamp on a moving track. It was OK but I didn't like the high humidity. The next two winters I put them in the upstairs room furthest from the heater and shut the vent. I ran the HPS light at night, which kept it above freezing. It was bright enough to maintain the plants healthy and cool enough to keep them from growing and etiolating. On a really cold night I lost a couple of Aloes closest to the window. The other plants bloomed great after those winters. I took a lot of ribbons in the July show.

If I were doing it now I would use LED or CFL lamps and a space heater. The HPS lamp exploded once when I wasn't home. I never figured out why. It burned a lot of plants.

Spider mites are a big problem for C&S when it's cool & dry. I sprayed everything with alcohol every 2 weeks. This worked.

[smweaver]

Thank you for the feedback regarding the cacti (and sorry to sort of have hijacked your original thread). Since I don't have too many plants, I usually bring them into the sunroom during the day and them back out to the garage at night. I have a small fan circulating at night to keep the air from becoming stagnant. So far they haven't seemed to be set back by any of this--and (importantly) they don't appear to come out of their dormancy for the short time that they're placed in sunny windows during the day.

If you're interested in trying some ansellias, Cal-Orchid has a couple of nice crosses that aren't listed on their website. Shoot them an email and Jim Rose will usually respond fairly quickly.

[estación seca]

Thank you. I'm going to see how I do with this one and perhaps go from there. They get to be fairly large plants so I don't want to take up space with something that struggles.