Vanda coerulea (in bloom)

[Bud]

That is your opinion. But I got my plant from a reputable grower and he tags it as Vanda coerulea; as far as I know my leaf span is ten inches and has also a height of 10 inches...that is what is described by the orchid wiki and also by IOSPE...so I dont know where you can find a shorter leaf span vanda unless it is a seedling...the color varies ...the wild one on the picture is light blue almost white...mine is a bit darker in the light but in another angle the color is also very light blueish lavender

[dries666]

I'm sorry Bud, but I also agree with wonderlen3000. The flower has obvious spotting and a colour that is not seen in the various true vanda coerulea strains. The leafspan is indeed much shorter than the plant here displayed, although something like that can vary a bit...

It does have the tesselation and the little hooks on the lip, as far as I can see from that pictures, so it has to be a really close hybrid, probably a first line hybrid, since the hooks from the coerulea disappear really quickly when hybridising with other vanda's.

It's a marvelous plant, no doubt about that, and congratulations for getting it to bloom!!

But Bud, don't tell other ppl to go and do more research when u urself seem to look past the obvious, Wonderlen is summing up some keyproperties for the plant to be a coerulea, so I think he knows what he's talking about. The pictures u posted from coerulea's; all three of them miss the spotting around the base of the sepals, besides, u should know how often a plant is mislabeled, even with good nurseries. I myself have a laelia purpurata 'semi-alba' from a very good nursery here in europe and when it flowered, it had lots of a pink hue in de sepals.... so it definetly wasn't a semi-alba..... mistakes are human, good nursery or not....

ps: great plant and great growing over there !!

friendly greetings,
Dries

[Bud]

Dries, I dont look past what is obvious. You and Wonderlen 3000 have Vanda coerulea supra (Lord Rothschild's Variety)on Youtube as basis of your specie...it is even rounder and fuller than my coerulea. In fact I have seen all the pictures of all Vanda coerulea in the net and in books and your argument is the spotting: if you go to Orchid wiki...the picture of the coerulea there have spotting at the base of the petals too(see attached)...now theres so many hues (maybe because of the lighting or the way our computer screen receives the colors...but I have a light colored blue coerulea most in the net are indigo and dark blue almost like a pachara...now the wild one is really light blue almost white...I really do not know why there is a lot of Vanda coerulea hues and shapes and forms...but my criteria is still the RHS and the Baker's picture of it...and I strongly beleive I have a Vanda coerulea...
now you and wonderlen3000 say I dont have a Vanda coerulea...then its your opinion...
I will abide with what my tag is: what I have is a Vanda coerulea.

[dries666]

the thing we learn here in school is... if it's from wikipedia.... don't expect it to be true. And that is quite a strange form and colour for a coerulea if i might say.

But u are completely right... the color of the flowers is very variable and will be different in each picture according to lightning/camera/etc...

And i also know there are varieties like lord supra's and the wild form... but all of them have reflexed petals (2 of them) in some degree... also they have very distinct hooks on their lips, your orchid also shows that, but in a lesser degree, and that's what makes me think that it might be a hybrid, along with the slightly longer leaves and speckles... but u are right, it's my opinion and to really settle this we would have to find an orchid expert.... but lets not go there shall we XD.

I was only saying that wonderlen had an excellent point in telling that and meant no harm by doing it, neither did I. But for what i have seen so far.... there have been countless and countless more wrong naming of the vanda coerulea.... and most of them just named it like that because it had tessellation and was very blue.

one thing u could check to see if its a close hybrid or the true plant itself, they should have been able to flower at really young age, so u should see leftovers of flowerstalks to a very low point on the plant. In comparison with other vandas and hybrids who tend to need 6 or even 7 years to mature and flower...

anyways, great growing and I am going to stop giving u my opinion right here

ps: the variety i like the most is the slender wild form with beautiful flowers, and not the breeded rounder and bigger forms... too bad that I will probably never find it.

greets,
Dries

[Bud]

no worries Dries...I will find a wild one (the slender flower and light blue you like) so we will not have any doubts anymore...but I am scared to grow orchids from the wild they might have virus...
plant is 5 yrs old...and on its 3rd bloom...you are right: the wild orchid might take 7 yrs to bloom...hope we are not yet too old! so maybe I find a blooming size one
* wikipedia is not always scientifically accurate...but most of what is written there are true...and it is always handy to have a basis or a norm...then we search for a better acurate answer

Thank You for making me learn more about my plant and to research on it; otherwise I would of just gone on forever complacent about its characteristics and form

[dries666]

nah, don't be worried cuz virusses can appear anywhere... even when they breed them so it has nothing to do with being a wild form or not. I hope i find one too one day, and that i learn to keep them better too because for now our air here is so dry that I get cramps from spraying its roots...

[Bud]

try a 2 gallon humidifier that you add water when you wake up and when you are about to sleep...its only cheap here about $40 ...I dont know how much it is in Belgium(oh I had a wonderful time in a small town called Genk...I had a schoolmate who once lived there and I came and visited her summer 2005)

[dries666]

hmm I have no idea where to get that from here... or how much it costs.

Well im from Leuven thats not too far from genk, only like 40 km...

[Bud]

try a pharmacy: sick people use them to breathe better and usually put some aromatherapy as steam goes out of the tank...but in the USA we get it in a hardware store and also in a big grocery store...oh orchid supplies also have them

[dries666]

I will do that, thanks a lot