Origins of Phalaenopsis hybrids
 

Hi

Is anyone able to tell me which Phalaenopsis species (historically speaking) were the most important in producing the hybrids that we see today? I.e. if we traced the parentage of most hybrids would we see the same wild species cropping up?

Thanks in advance

Rich

If this is part of the book project you mentioned in your intro, I suggest that you purchase OrchidWiz software, as it can provide the species in the background of any hybrid (except early RHS registrations that had questionable or missing info).

However, that’s going tome an immense project, as there are thousands and thousands of phalaenopsis hybrids to research.

There did seem to be a base species used originally but I haven't been following it that closely.

It is interesting when you can identify what species was most likely used in a cross.

Popular ones to use were
violacea
luddemaniana
venosa
amboinensis
amibilis
gigantea
Tetraspis
Corningiana
Bellina and many more

One can tell rather easily if an amibilis was a parent because the flower lip will have little antennae looking structures.

Gigantea is used a lot to give hybrids bigger flowers and these can be identified by their big leaves.

Tetraspis has been used quite a bit to create hybrids that produce more flowers. These then tend to produce keiki's more readily, another way to tell, if it produces a big bunch of smaller flowers and readily produces keiki's then it probably has a tetraspis parent in there

Hi Ray

Thanks for your reply and your suggestion about OrchidWiz - ill look into that. The project is not so much about looking into thousands of Phalaenopsis hybrids as such, I’m more interested in trying to pinpoint which Phalaenopsis species were the most commonly used, particularly with regards to early (Victorian) collectors.
I stumbled across Phals.net and from that I can see that Veitch tended to use amabilis, equestris, stuartiana and violacea quite regularly.

Many thanks

Rich

---------- Post added at 01:55 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:52 PM ----------

Hi Shadeflower

Thanks very much for your reply. Yes, the base species are the ones that I am particularly interested in and as I said in my reply to Ray, it seems that people like Veitch regularly used some of the species that you mentioned.

I’m wondering if it was P.amabilis that could be considered the ‘original’ Phalaenopsis that kicked off the early Victorian hybrids? Any insight would be most welcome.

Thanks

Rich

It would be interesting to know I guess. It's a bit before my time, I am sure someone does know more about it than me.
I am literally just a hobbyist who is interested so for example I know that this one has come up a few times looking at parentage:

Phalaenopsis Mount Kaala

Whether it is one of the first ones used for modern hybrids, who knows but those flowers are still being sold in supermarkets today 50 years later. Unfortunately other breeders also sometimes copied crosses so there might even be more than one that was used but had the same parents for example.

looking closer phal doris Phalaenopsis Doris

was a parent of that one which was created in the 1940's.

If you look at the immedate offspring on that site you can see how many hybrids have been created from it since.

I think looking at google a bit closer the Phal Doris is most likely the hybrid that was used for mass phal production which started about 20 years later.

Thanks - that orchidroots website looks like it could be helpful

Well, waddyaknow....

A feature of OrchidWiz gave the attached (screen cap) list of the top 20 species used in F1 hybrids.

I just added a second image, showing how it has changed over time.

Thanks Ray - that’s exactly the info that i needed! Very much appreciated

Cheers

Rich

Take a look at that new image I attached

Excellent! Even more useful!