How old is this catt?
 

Hi :waving

This is a cattleya dowiana and I wanted to know how old you think it is. It has five leaves the biggest is a little over 6".

Thanks for any help :)

My guess would be 5-6 years and still several years from blooming.

Thanks thats what I thought but was not sure :)

I'm not too sure how old it is, but I would say it has 2-3 more years until it blooms. If you can push it to grow without dormancy, then it will be a bit sooner.

Thanks :D

Stated in a slightly different way, I'd say it probably has 3 growth cycles to blooming. How fast you can get it there depends partly on your conditions and care.

How can you tell how far a catt is from blooming?

by how old it is, like a paph can take about 7 years to bloom so if the plant is 5 years old you know it will take about 2 more years for it to bloom. That is how the other OB members can tell me how long it will take for my catt to bloom because they know how old it is :D

For me its an estimate based on prior growing experience with this species. ;)

I could probably get it to bloom within a year. It just needs one p-bulb to get to mature size, winter rest, and voila'.

But then again, we have an extended growing period down here, especially this winter (more like spring/fall).