Rare Earth Orchids
Rare Earth Orchids seems to host biannual sales of many Catasetum that can't really be found elsewhere. The only other nursery that specializes in Catasetum that I know of is SVO. So it's without question that I tried to get my hands on some of their species in the latest sale. I named 10 or so plants but was allowed to purchase 5: 4 Catasetum alliance and 1 Cymbidium.
The plants I received seemed okay, but, as you know, I test every orchid I get my hands on. It turns out that 3 out of the 4 Catasetum that I was allowed to purchase had ORSV. I don't want to malign Mr. Stephen Moffitt's reputation. He said he would refund me, no questions asked, and touted his clean practices.
But while it's a small sample size, it would still be a very rare occurrence that it's a coincidence that I happened to get them if the overall virus rate in the collection would only be 5-10%. For example, assuming he didn't happen to have stored all the species together, and if his overall rate is 25%, there would still be less than a 5% chance that I happened to get 3 of them that are virused.
My point isn't to cry doom and gloom at his undoubtedly wonderful collection, but more as a notice to the members of this community, that if you care about viruses, and you've taken part in the recent Fall sale, you might want to get tested as a precaution.
I am, on the one hand, very happy at Stephen's response, but on the other, very disappointed that it put my collection at risk, and between the shipping of 5 plants and the cost of 7 tests (retested to be sure), I've basically spent over 100 for just 2 plants that are not virused. It went from reasonably priced to very expensive. Some of this is just the cost of buying orchids online, but if they were not virused, it would have been 2 tests (3 samples per well) and 5 plants for just over 130.
You might disagree with the way I did my analysis, so take it for what you may.
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