Ansellia africana
 

I believe that there is some debate, whether this is a swarm of closely related species, or a single species with considerable variation. Anyway, a couple of years ago Cal-Orchids had the Afri nursery from South Africa as a guest vendor at their summer sale. I bought 6 seedlings, and have now bloomed the first two.

The first flower is 2.5" natural spread, so it is large:

The second flower is 1.7/8" natural spread, but it is very full. As an experiment, we have used it to pollinate a good pendulous Cymbidium.

OK Kim. Why doesn't mine grow? Or do anything actually. It just sits there and does absolutely nada for 2 full years so far.

I pulled it out of the pot a couple months ago just to take a peek under the hood. Roots were "meh" but there were a couple of really healthy looking ones so I put it in a basket with fir bark to see if it needed to breath a bit more. Still no change, but like I said, it's only been a couple months.

I only have small seedlings from SVO. If they dry out once they sulk for many months. I haven't moved them to S/H (from the bark they came in) because I haven't seen a good flush of new roots. I have a hard time giving enough water unless I stand the pots in dishes of water all the time. Even with old roots they take up that water much faster than it could evaporate. Of course your growing conditions are a lot different than mine.

These are beautiful! Congrats!

Not enough sunlight maybe? They like to be on the brighter side of Cattleya light.

Maybe. I can try that.
Thanks Stephen.

Keysguy:

I grow these in clay pots, with a spaghnum/bark mix (4:1 or so). I try to make sure that they never dry out. I hang them high, so they get good light.

I bought 6 of these from the Afri guest visit:
4 are growing very well (2 blooming)
1 is not doing much
1 has lost two recent new growths

I bought some new ones from SVO, which I left in his 3" plastic pots for now (I was too busy to repot). They have not done much in the 3-4 months I have had them.

That's interesting, why don't you let them dry out, especially during winter?

KG, me too! mine has done zero but lose a few leaves in 2-3 years. i have it with my cattleyas.


i have no idea, maybe they are smart and therefore dont like Florida? :)

In a talk by Lourens Grobler of Afri Orchids that I heard, he said that these want to dry out in winter. (I don't dry mine, likely they would bloom better if they did) Personally, I'd be very cautious and gentle about applying the "dry" advice to seedlings. But for mature plants, that might help blooming.

Yes, my memory tells me that Lourens mentioned these don't bloom as well (or at all?) unless there's a dry winter rest. I don't recall his exact words though.