Bulb. gracillimum
 

This is an unusual bulbophyllum that I received as a door prize at one of the Orchid Society banquets. The plant came from Wilbur Chang's collection. The central core of the flower has a diameter of 3/4-inch. The diameter of the imaginary circle formed by the tips of the petals is about 3 inches. The plant is grown in a 3-inch square plastic pot with New Zealand sphagnum as the media.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4007/...70aebc0d_z.jpg
Bulb. gracillimum by hawaiiansunshine, on Flickr

Ohhh, that's a cool one!
Joann

Wow, great picture Mel! I love this species but I've found it hard to photograph. Have you found this one to always be a winter bloomer?

--Nat

Hi Nat. Thank you for your comment. Like you indicated, it is a challenge to photograph these, especially if you want to show the inflorescence and the plant in one shot. This is the first time that the plant has bloomed since I got it. Hopefully, it will bloom more than once per year. The plant is an extremely slow grower.

Wow very cool! Do you by any chance have a picture of the plant in it's pot? I love seeing those kinds of pictures as well!

Wow, what a cool chid. What a great picture of it as well.

Stunning just stunning

My biggest challenge in photographing these blooms has been simultaneously getting the detail, color, depth of field, and exposure to come out looking right. Your picture is definitely one of the better photographic representations I've seen of this species.

My larger gracillimum has bloomed several times for me during the fall and winter, and it's only got 8 pseudobulbs so far. It just finished the most recent bloom a few weeks ago. I'm suspecting it's primarily a fall-winter bloomer, but I'm holding out hope that it will throw another spike in time for my orchid society's spring show at the end of March. :crossfing What could be the blooming cue if these follow a similar schedule in both HI and NC? Day length? Nighttime temperature drop? I wonder if these bloom during southern hemisphere winter when they're grown there? This species has a fairly wide natural geographic range that I think is trans-equatorial (though tropical enough that day length probably stays fairly constant year-round); it would be interesting to find out if they all tend to bloom in the same months in the wild... Anyway, thanks for posting your picture!

--Nat

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but my b. gracillimum is spiking now, except one of the 2 spikes essentially shriveled before fully opening. Not sure if these are very transient bloomers, or my humidity was just too low, but I'm hoping to be able to catch the second spike before it dies!