Geez, am I not done yet? Soon, my friends, soon. Today I received no less than three shipments from three different vendors, all in all 18 orchids. And next week another six should arrive... My God, where are me and the kitties going to stay since the chids will have taken over the flat?
So, today I got my orders from Popow, Elsner and Asendorfer Orchideenzucht and let's not waste anymore time talking about unnecessary stuff and move onto the good stuff; the pictures:
First out is the Phals from Popow; the ones in the back are equestris 'Blue Lip' and those in front are equestris Ilocus. Two of these are being shipped on Monday to a friend of mine that I ordered together with. The thing I'm concerned about when it comes to my 'Blue Lip' is that it has a black spot on the stem. It looks like some kind of possible bacteria/rot spot which I'll have to do something about as soon as possible. The other three Phals look to be in good condition:
I ordered four Pahs from Popow as well, an appletonianum, a helenae, a purpuratum, and a venustum. Unfortunately, the Paphs were in a not as good a condition as the Phals, mostly due to the not too great packaging. The purpuratum have been squeezed, almost crushed underneath another plant and only have one nice fan - the others will hopefully recover somewhat and not die (don't let the picture fool you). The helenae looks like it has been infested with some pests at some time (it might still be, so I'm going to isolate it from the rest of the noobs and again, don't let the picture fool you). The rest of the Paphs look more or less fine, all have some slight damages due to rough handling when being packed, and due to not enough protection between the plants in the package.
Anyway, here they are; the upper row from left to right; purpuratum, appletonianum, venustum (this guy has the most gorgeous foliage I've ever seen!
), lower row from left to right; superbiens (bonusplant) and helenae:
Here's the order from Elsner. The overall impression I got was that the quality of both the plants and the packaging were much better than the Popow ones. All the plants look very fine and healthy, the only one that makes me a bit worried is the big guy in the back Paph. robelenii which also looks like it has or have had some sort of pest infestation, I'll keep a close eye on this one as well. The other plants are as follows, middle row from left to right; Phal. Little Sister, Phal. Venus, Phal. Buena Jewel x equestris alba (depending on what the flowers look like I might keep it or I might sell it), Phal. Rainbow Chip x Lius Bright Ruby (same as with the previous one), Phal. Equiwilson, Phal. equestris 'Blue Lip':
And finally, my little Paph order from Asendorfer. I ordered three; a barbatum var. nigritum, a lawrenceanum, and an urbanianum. I got a little surprise in my package since I got a robinsonii (bullenianum) as a bonusplant. This guy was on my wishlist so I got real happy to receive one! The quality of the plants totally blew me away, they look very healthy all of them and since they were so well packaged, they've received no damage due to the transportation. Not only were the Paphs so healthy looking they were practically shining, even the substrate looks fresh! These guys I don't feel I'll have to re-pot, all I need to do is take a little peek at their roots and then they can go straight back in again.
Anyway, here they are, from top to bottom, left to right (you know the drill by now, right?); lawrenceanum, robinsonii, urbanianum, and barbatum var. nigritum:
So far I would rank the vendors like this:
Asendorfer
Elsner
Schwerter
Popow
And some more hauls...
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