Questions about buying on Ebay

[gngrhill]

I have never bought anything on Ebay auction and have a question. I registered on Ebay because there was an orchid I was interested in. I placed a bid and it immediately came up that a higher bid was placed. I placed a second bid, and it immediately came up that a higher bid was placed again. My question is, is there really someone who has like an automatic increase thingy or is it the seller doing an automatic increase to get it up to what they really want for it ? The seller is Kawamoto Orchids, who I know are very highly rated.