Catasetum albovirens - a female flower
 

Well, this is kind of a pitiful little thing! Holst's book says this species produces smallish flowers on very large plants. My plant is very, very small; there is just the one flower.
I believe that the sex of the flowers is due more to the size and health of the plant than the amount of light - in the past, I have only had female flowers on very old, large, overgrown plants.
And, I grow all my catasetinae in very bright light.
The flower is about 2cm across; plant has pseudobulbs about 2" tall. Small. No scent that I can detect...then again, I could inhale the whole flower trying.

Nancy, when you say "very high light"...do you mean something like vanda light, Catt light, something else?
Mine seem to be "stuck". I kept them in less light to get male flowers but they didn't seem to do much at all. Now, I moved them up to more light, less than my Catts and they seem to be growing but still no spikes or blooms. :scratchhead:

What am I doing wrong?

Hi Susanne -
They get as much sun as I can given them without burning. Which is a bit less than Vanda but more than Cattleya. The catasetinae are at the top of my orchid-hanging thing (sawhorse brackets with 8' 2x4s, studded with hooks), and the Dends, Catts are at the bottom.
For what it's worth, I really took Arthur Holst's growing methods to heart - I do not unpot, cut off roots, or divide p'bulbs in the winter. Most are in baskets or on mounts, but the past 2 years' pseudobulbs are 2-4x larger than the previous ones, so the plants themselves are growing much more heartily.
Regards - Nancy

Thanks, Nancy :)

sort of cool how they look like a slipper

Well, as far as I know, the more light you give, the more chances to get female flowers. Move them to the shade and you get male flowers.

Well, I keep reading that, but it has not been my experience. Maybe it's an urban legend, like the 'dumb blonde'.
The female flowers are pretty similar looking generally in catasetums - little green helmets, with or without ears.
Cheers - Nancy

I do think it is well established that the higher the energy that the plant has or can produce the higher the probability of having female flowers. It seems difficult to say what is more important, if size or light. And frankly why should we care? If we want female flowers we go for the light and big plants. Male flowers, less light and smaller plants or fewer pseudobulbs.

But yes, I don't understand why a simple statement like this is not more wide spread. perhaps it just started with the light and now it is tradition. :evil:

As far as I know the more light Catasetum gets it is likely to produce female flowers. I have this to share with you. I usually get 3 flowers on a spike. After that the pseudobulb would dry up and new ones would grow:

http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/6...23smallxc5.jpg

Recently, I have been putting the plant in a more shady area to test the conditions and wolla, it produced male flowers and here they are:

The buds:

http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/2...90smalljb7.jpg

The blooms:

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/3...00smallgp3.jpg

http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/6...01smallsb8.jpg

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/9...02smalliq8.jpg

Nancy, I agree with you about this light thing---a plant that is the most healthy might produce females while a less vibrant plant might only want -have the strength to--spread its pollen instead of maturing 100,000 seeds all winter long---I've experimented with all kinds of light levels and that isn't a big part of the equation---health is more important