Laelia purpurata. Please Help
 

Hey all! how are you guys?? well here is the deal! i have fallen in love with these orchids! especially Laelia purpurata Var Carnea. now i need to know everything you do, about them! do they require a rest of any sort? i grow mostly catts and a couple brassavola and two vandas. all are healthy and blooming. now i would like to extend to laelia. can you please give me some advice before i decide to buy so i can be certain i will be able to grow it. ive looked online but havent found too much info. so im hoping some of you who have grown it can shed some light. Please help me! ;)

Hard not to love L purpurata! this past fall and spring I got a couple - seem to be easy to grow - not sure yet about the blooming - both of mine have sheaths but no blooms yet. I think I see buds in the carnea sheaths now :)

In the winter I had mine in a south facing window - and now they are on front porch where they receive early morning to near mid-day sun.

I have read to grow them a bit dry during winter- a bit less so now.

I am sure more experienced growers will chime in with more info and advice - but just wanted to say that in my experience so far they have been quite easy! We'll see if I get blooms lol
I would say "get it!" lol

Agree that they're very easy. Especially since they bloom in summer. Yours might bloom late in summer since your spring growing season probably comes late. Never visited your area, but we researched it for a possible stopover ... not enough time though. Read about a guy named Ichabod Crane who lived nearby.

Okay Cool! im so happy you guys got back to me so fast, Thank you! i will most ikely buy it! ill wait just a litlle bit for more feedback just so i can get as much advice as possible haha. now the dilema is where to get it from? nice big plants with a bunch of growths! odoms always has plants like that but they don't sell this one

Okay Cool! im so happy you guys got back to me so fast, Thank you! i will most ikely buy it! ill wait just a litlle bit for more feedback just so i can get as much advice as possible haha. now the dilema is where to get it from? nice big plants with a bunch of growths! odoms always has plants like that but they don't sell this one

I have few purpurata's, they are easy to grow here in Southern Cal. mine are mounted or growing in granite chips. I grow mine in full sun all year long, as for watering I try to water everyday but being mounted they are dry by mid day and I don't give a winter rest so to speak I just am not able to water regularly in winter

Cool im going to buy it! ive called The Santa Barbra Orchid Estate for one they said they are gonna go find one for me. i hope they have one! i called Parkside and they dont have any blooming size ones only ones that are 2 years from blooming, Called hausermann and they only have them in flasks, Is SBorchids doesn't have one where should i look?? I really really want one! especially since mine are growing and blooming regularly! i finally got it right with this type of orchid and am going to stick to it for now and this one is a must have!

I have seen some on Angelstreet Orchids website - Cattleya

I got my carnea from them a few months ago - the drawback is shipping cost from hawaii - not sure how much it works out to from them
not horribly brutal sounding ... depends how badly you want the plant i guess lol -
or can rationalize that you need to get another plant as well to make the s/h cost worthwhile

Hey Rabbit! How healthy and big were the plants? the cost all together for me is only 30 bucks but i kinda told Sb that i would take a plant from them if they don pan out i will buy from these guys. if they are healthy and good plants?

Plant was listed as 4" pot - in sheath
plant I got was definitely ready for a bigger pot and had 2 sheaths :D still hasn't bloomed yet - but I do now see buds in the sheaths :D. Roots were very good as well

pic is plant I received when I received it - so when it was still in the 4" pot

WoW!!!!!!!!!!!!! if Sb doesn't have one i am soooo going to buy from them!!!!!! sb said they would find one in bloom for me is they could so im gonna wait and see. i had known about these guys first i would have talked with them first!

I'm sure SBOE has very nice plants too! which variety are you looking at? Coulda sworn I read carnea somewhere but not sure - apparently some are larger than others, tho all are beautiful! - the one in the pic is a carnea and is larger than my werkhauserii - tho that was listed as NBS when I got it, it did get a sheath only a few months later, and is not the monster the carnea is - so far lol.
I can't wait to see what you get - and if from SBOE how the plant is - I haven't ever bought from them - tho I frequently drool over the website ;)

Hi 17. I think you will find L. purpurata one of the easiest of the standard size Laelias to grow and flower. I grow several and find that they not only do well in most any well drained media, but take to S/H like a duck to water. Tropical Orchid Farms in Hawaii carries a number of varieties about a year away from blooming as does Lowes Orchids in Hawaii. SBOE as mentioned has several varieties and while I have always thought they were a little overpriced, their quality will be excellent. I don't really give them a winter rest and find that they still bloom well for me. The only problem with growing L. purpuratas is that they tend to become rather "habit forming"!!!! Good luck with yours.

Yeah Jerry i Want a Carnea! Yeah they are a little pricey! The carnea is 35 bucks then the person said is was gonna be 20 bucks for shipping. Now when you Say monster plant how monster are we talking here!?
Godzilla, King Kong, OR Transformer huge? either way i will still get it.
One more thing Sb grows their laelia's interesting. the person i talked to in the green house said that when they over grow the pot they just slip the whole plant pot and all into a larger pot with no medium or anything and let it scramble over the sides into the next pot! how does that work?

Exotic Orchids of Maui had some in sheath. I got one and it was big, healthy, and beautiful with two sheaths that are now showing buds. Worth checking out.

Well my carnea is taller than the werkhauserii - both are first time bloomers if they decide to actually bloom for me. In the pic you can see by comparision to the pot size (standard 4" pot) that it is quite tall. Still fits on a window sill tho ;) but is quite 'tipsy' its now in a clay pot and have the clay pot inside a ceramic one to help stabilize it :)

I have bought most of my laelia's from SB ORCHIDS. Yes they are a little pricey but the plants are big.
Here is a pic of the one I purchased last month, it is growing in what looks like granite chips.

ohh Awesome! SBOE just emailed me today and they have a nice one with 4 growths and new lead that is pretty well along and Alice (the woman who is helping me) said she didnt see a Sheath. but im still hopeful because sometimes they poke out a little later i know thats how my big catt Dumbeat heritage does it. It send up the growth and then when its just about full size it sends up the little sheath and then the sarong dries out. so im still hopeful that this one may bloom!

I'm not trying to throw cold water on your parade (or L. purpurata as the case may be), but I wouldn't count on any L. purpurata coming from California that isn't already in sheath to bloom this year. Santa Barbara is quite a bit (well, a LOT) cooler than here in Bakersfield, but if the plant was raised there at SBOE and doesn't currently have a sheath I wouldn't count on blooms this year. That's not necessarily all a bad thing though 18. This will give you and the plant time to find just the right conditions to grow on toward next year and bountiful blooms!!

Very true! and i dont mind if it doesnt bloom! because then i have greater satisfaction when it does because i know that i did it and that my conditions and the plant match well! you are absolutely right! well i am awaiting the fun journey of growing this beauty!

Now question: the person i talked to in the greenhouse said that when they over grow the pot they just slip the whole plant pot and all into a larger pot with no medium or anything and let it scramble over the sides into the next pot! how does that work?

Very true! and i dont mind if it doesnt bloom! because then i have greater satisfaction when it does because i know that i did it and that my conditions and the plant match well! you are absolutely right! well i am awaiting the fun journey of growing this beauty!

Now question: the person i talked to in the greenhouse said that when they over grow the pot they just slip the whole plant pot and all into a larger pot with no medium or anything and let it scramble over the sides into the next pot! how does that work?

Lots of big blooming purpurata here in Florida. I recently sold one that would not fit in a 20 inch basket.

Lots of 6 inch pots available with 4-10 flowers. The season is ending for these to flower so flowering plants are becoming scarcer. They are early summer bloomers.

I really do not recommend putting these in a larger pot without removing the old medium.

Rot will become extreme in the old pot. Most Cattleya die in the middle of a pot if the medium is not removed and refreshed every two years or so.

Ok cool i will not do that then! thank you so much for answering my question!

If potted in granite chips - ? someone mentioned that - obviously granite wont rot or decompose.
Still - I haven't heard of potting the whole thing plant and pot into a larger pot - but if potted in granite chips you could remove plant with medium from the pot and place in a bigger pot and add media - tho I have not done this (will be trying it with some dens tho)

yah! ive actually done this before! with a really huge 16 growth Lc. Drumbeat Heritage i got from Odoms that i didnt wanna split cuz i wanted to make a specimen out of it because i love it so much! Imagine a drumbeat with all od those huge flowers! Have a plant like Mauro LOL, though i dont think i ever could! The original plant media was lava rock. so i just took ot out of the pot and slipped it into a bigger one with more lava. We will see how it goes. so far so great, it now has 4 bloom sheaths!

To clear up a few things and answer a few of your concerns.
I have been to Santa Barbara orchid estates, their nursury is huge, I talked to one of the workers in the nursery about the pot inside a pot and this it what he said and showed me.

Fist there is no media other than granit chips if it has any media at all.

Second he said it was easier and faster for them to place an overgrown Laelia into the next size pot, pot and all, this is to help contain the roots. They have a huge laelia collection and would be very time consuming to repot.

If you are ever in the Santa Barbara area you must visit them to see what I'm talking about.

Mike

yah def! i really will! and that makes perfect sense! when mine if it gets overgrown should i do the same? or just do it the old fashioned way and change to all new media?

Hooray! it just arrived! and the new growth is at the stage where the leaf just opened and where the P-bulb will be is still really thin and not expanded yet at all. soo even though you already told me that there probably wont be a sheath im still hoping! it could still be down there. i am hopeful! but i won't get my hopes up too much i promise! i will post pics i promise, of the plant