Quote:
Originally Posted by wisdomseeker
Those are some very nice acquisitions!
L. kettieana has been on my wish list (and flying under the radar) for awhile. I've been hesitant, mainly because my growing conditions lean more toward the warm/hot side.
How are you growing this one (any tips)?
I've had trouble keeping up with the current scientific 'name-game' changes. So, on that note: is this still considered a Laelia or has the name been changed to Cattleya? Also (out of curiosity), how did your area fare with hurricane Barry? Hopefully you did not have any damage.
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The L. kettieana might actually be one of the
more suitable ones for the warm/hot temps. It still needs a nice, bright cool down in the winter but it does get hot humid summers in situ. Actually, even my rupicolous Laelias that are firmly in the cool growing category are doing wonderful outside (90-100F) as long as they are hydrated. These two newest ones are staying in the bark and cork chunk mix for now (the rest of mine, I’m trying out growing in a clay pot with a tight collar of sphag), they all get watered daily, all in normal-to-bright Cattleya light, I’ll lightly fertilize if I remember, and all are growing like weeds. I plan on leaving these two new ones outside for the winter like I did for my others last year, keeping them dry, only a bit of water on some warmer days, and increasing the light levels with a good bit of direct sun. So far that seems to be working. I didn’t lose any of my Brazilian imports last year and I have sheaths on the L. lucasiana, L. milleri, and L. gloedeniana.
And yeah, these are technically Cattleyas. I just can’t seem to bring myself to refer to them as such
and I know I’m not the only one
Thankfully, Barry was one big non event for us. We had flooding on one day but nothing terrible. Only thing that got damaged orchid-wise was the much anticipated spike on my Polystachya paniculata. That spike toast
Hybrid Mode
