Vanda Miss Joaquim 'Douglas' 4N

[Bud]

Vanda Miss Joaquim became Singapore's national flower in 1981. Singapore is the only nation to have a hybrid orchid as its national flower yet this country produce many beautiful orchid flowers and no orchid is more worthy of being Singapore's national flower than Vanda Miss Joaquim as it is the first registered plant hybrid from Singapore.
This is a cross between Vanda hookeriana and Vanda teres both hardy and free flowering. It was described by the first director of the Singapore Botanic Gardens Mr. HN Ridley in 1893, who named it after Agnes Joaquim since the plant was the result of a cross created by Miss Joaquim. While many of the Armenians in Singapore achieved political and social acclaim during their lifetimes, it is a woman whose name lives on, both in Singapore and beyond. She is Ashkhen Hovakimian (Agnes Joaquim) who bred the world's first cultivated Vanda hybrid.
I give Vanda Miss Joaquim full sunlight, free air movement, high humidity and feed it with K-Lite fertilizer and seaweed mix to achieve optimum growth and flowering. It needs support to grow straight and tall but it flowers only when the top of its stem rises above the support. It is a robust, sun loving plant with slender stems that I have potted in perlite, bark, lava rock, charcoal and sponge rock mix with the help of a tree fern stick to support it.