Pollinator?

[jkofferdahl]

Hopefully I've placed this in the right forum.

Does anyone know what is the pollinator of Encyclia garciana by any chance? Mine came into bloom around the first of March. These are delightfully long-lasting flowers with the most wonderful cinnamon fragrance. Almost every day, while watering my mounted minis, where this plant lives, I've admired the flowers and enjoyed the scent. While doing so this morning I realized that the flowers were fading (quite too fast for this species), and then that the ovaries of all three flowers were swelling.

I'll miss these flowers, but there'll be more. What I'm wondering now is what creature has snuck into my orchid room in the dead of night and had his way with my lovely lady?!

[bil]

Originally Posted by jkofferdahl

Hopefully I've placed this in the right forum.

Does anyone know what is the pollinator of Encyclia garciana by any chance? Mine came into bloom around the first of March. These are delightfully long-lasting flowers with the most wonderful cinnamon fragrance. Almost every day, while watering my mounted minis, where this plant lives, I've admired the flowers and enjoyed the scent. While doing so this morning I realized that the flowers were fading (quite too fast for this species), and then that the ovaries of all three flowers were swelling.

I'll miss these flowers, but there'll be more. What I'm wondering now is what creature has snuck into my orchid room in the dead of night and had his way with my lovely lady?!

Some orchid flowers self pollinate very easily. Could it be that? I have a Cattleya Tristar that will drop its flowers very quickly if I don't castrate the flowers pdq.

[jkofferdahl]

I suppose that's possible. If so, however, I'd expect it to happen fairly quickly while these flowers were open for over a month. Still, it's a better explanation than the houseflies I've seen.