If you ever wondered how big a Vanda could grow

[Suri85]

Originally Posted by smweaver

That's pretty awesome, and a very cool species too. If only I could provide the kind of heat it requires. Thanks for posting the photo. The owner must be quite proud of her accomplishment.

She is pretty good growing Vandas, it's one of her specialty genus. She has a Vanda devogtii that almost reaching that size.

Having said that, she is a bit concerned that the daughters drain too much energy from the mother, she told me that the flowers this time is not as great as before. After the bloom is over, she is going to separate the daughters, and I have expressed my interest for one of the daughter.

[smweaver]

Are the "daughters" forming their own root systems? If not, then I can kind of understand her concerns (although the species has undoubtedly evolved so that the adult plants can support the basal growths they produce, so the concern is probably unwarranted). My adult V. merrillii has three large basal growths and none of them has yet to produce a single root. So perhaps it's normal for the plants to grow like this. In any event, she (the lady who owns the plant) is doing a superb job.

[Ray]

Keiki formation does not "sap" the strength of the mother plant. Just the opposite, in fact.

Even if they don't have roots, those "daughter" plants are part of the plant, so are contributing through photosynthesis and storage of nutrients and energy.

If flowering was reduced, it was some other cultural factor that played a role, not the formation of new offshoots.

Sometimes (particularly true of phalaenopsis), plants will form keikies instead of blooming when the culture is inadequate. It is a secondary method of carrying on the gene pool. However, sometimes that can lead to misinterpretation, with folks thinking it was the keikies that weakened the plant and prevented blooming, rather than the opposite, that the weakened plant responded by forming keikies, thereby creating more nutrient uptake and energy creation capacity.

[OliverSparrow]

Vanda dearei. I've been looking for that for years. Bogor was going to send us a flask, but it didn't happen. Would this little thing count as a seedling for CITES?

[Chatbud]

Mdm Sumarni is an esteemed grower in the region and is an orchid judge too.

[OliverSparrow]

Let's try again. I posted and nothing happened. This is Vanda dearei, which I have been trying to get hold of for a decade. Anyone with eg seedlings please make yourselves known.

[Suri85]

The beaurocracy here is atrocious! A few years ago the Indonesian Orchid association almost didn't make it to the Singapore Garden Festival because they couldn't get their export documentations. They finally got it at the very last minutes.

But having said that, many of our species got smuggled out of the country...

[RosieC]

Wow that vanda is massive!