Psychopsiella limminghei

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

For some reason, I thought I had posted about this orchid via my own thread a long time ago, but apparently I haven't…

These photos are from 2012, but I still own this plant. I've owned this plant since 2008, (it doesn't feel like I've had it for that long, but according to past records, yes, I have).

If I'm not mistaken, it doesn't bloom every year. From my recollection, this orchid blooms once every 2 years.

It grows painfully slow, and pretty much resembles a miniature version of their cousins Psychopsis.

Just like their cousins, the pseudobulbs turn brown when exposed to intense lighting. The leaves will also present itself with their mottled brown pigmentation when exposed to bright indirect light, which is evident in the pic below, (bottom right corner).

Unlike Psychopsis, these are not sequential bloomers. It's one flower per spike, and once it's done, it's done.

It is temperature tolerant. I grow this outdoors year round, mounted on a tree fern pole.

They're moderately easy to grow, not something I'd recommend to a total newbie.

I'll post a pic of the seed pod later.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

The other flower pic from a slightly different angle.

[euplusia]

Congratulations on successfully growing and flowering this one. Exact spelling is limminghei.

[Vanda lover]

If it only blooms once every 2 years I wouldn't keep it, but if you are growing it outdoors then space wouldn't matter.

[MrHappyRotter]

Pretty cool little plant. It seems to me like the reason to grow it would be for the beautiful foliage, not for the tiny flowers that don't even show up every year.

The foliage is really nice though, so that alone would make it worthwhile.

If it's not too much trouble, could you take some photos the leaves and share those as well?

Either way, thanks for the photos, I like this little species.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

Originally Posted by euplusia

Congratulations on successfully growing and flowering this one. Exact spelling is limminghei.

Thank you. It was quite a test in patience! I'm glad it is around. It is a nice treat to have. I love how the flowers look very insect-like.

Yeah, this orchid's name is a hard one to remember how to spell correctly. Thank you.

I'm going to have to as a moderator to help me change the title of the thread.

---------- Post added at 08:33 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:29 AM ----------

Originally Posted by MrHappyRotter

Pretty cool little plant. It seems to me like the reason to grow it would be for the beautiful foliage, not for the tiny flowers that don't even show up every year.

The foliage is really nice though, so that alone would make it worthwhile.

If it's not too much trouble, could you take some photos the leaves and share those as well?

Either way, thanks for the photos, I like this little species.

Sure. No problem.

The flower is not really that tiny. They're about 3/4" across. So they're pretty large for a mini.

[Vanda lover]

It does have beautiful leaves.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

Here's the first pic.

These are all older pseudobulbs that have lost their leaves. This is normal for this species.

As you can see, the pseudobulbs exposed to brighter light are brown.

Eventually, the older pseudobulbs die back too, as you can see from the last one that is kind of an orangey-beige color.

This specimen grew through the tree fern pole and the new growths came out on the other side, so I took a photo of the new growths as well.

[King_of_orchid_growing:)]

These are the new growths. The lead leaf is a bit twisted on this right now, but the leaves usually lay parallel/flat against the growing medium just like the leaf on the bottom right shows. This lead leaf developed this way because it had to push through the treen fern fibers.

There are probably 2 or 3 pseudobulbs buried inside the tree fern fibers.

In the foreground, to the right of the photo, hanging on the inflorescence is the seed pod.

[euplusia]

I keep my fingers crossed that you succeed in raising seedlings. This species is very pretty and hard to get by, the bulbs are snugged to the bark, the foliage is decorative, the plant doesn't take much space and flowers are big compared to the plant size. But I don't have one.