Sobralia season!
 

Here are the first Sobralias of the season to bloom for me. These are two different plants of the same unnamed cross, Sobralia powellii x Sobralia macrantha f. alba . Nice example of genetic variation.

Flowers only last a couple of days, but will produce flowers sequentially over about 2 months. I see buds developing quickly on several other plants, I'll add to the thread as they bloom.

In frost-free areas, these can grow as landscape plants if they have good drainage. Not at my house, the soil is heavy adobe clay. So small bark in pots, but they don't need repotting very often because although they can grow epiphytically, they are pretty much terrestrials.

wow!!
well done my friend!

and if you happen to divide any of these and want to see how they do as landscape plants in a frost free environment with good drainage...:briggrin: i might know a guinea pig

Will definitely be happy to share when I get to dividing. Something I don't look forward to, but have a couple of them where I will probably have to bite the bullet. One of them I got off a society table, root ball was sort of squared off... like it was gently divided with a table saw. It has taken off, grown new roots and will be a candidate if I can figure out how to deal with the very large pot. The root ball of these tends to get very compacted... the only way to divide is to slice through it. But it doesn't seem to matter. Weeds.

A story about a Sobralia xantholeuca that I ordered from Andy (he brought it to a show for me) ... closely related to S. macrantha, which grows very easily outside for me. But the one from Andy was labeled "I" rather than "I/C" or "W/I/C" ... I asked him was this warmer-growing than macrantha such that i should worry about it... he said, "No, but if it has a "C" on it people in south Florida won't buy them. So I learned that "I" on an Andy tag could mean "Intermediate", like not below 50 deg F., it could mean that he didn't know what it needed when he got it so started intermediate (where practically everything will grow) and later discovered that it could grow cooler but the computer wasn't updated, or it could mean that he didn't want to discourage Floridians. So, "I" on his tags means "Inquire".

The South American vendors sell several very dwarf Sobralias, like S. fragrans, which fits nicely in a 1 quart/liter S/H pot. People are trying to breed small hybrids. I've seen them at the Pacific Orchid Expo.

I have those too... Sob. callosa is particularly cute. Flowers are really short lived, but brilliant (and sequential) I think that one is about the smallest. (Also relatively warm-growing... I am growing it outside now, but it was also doing well in the greenhouse) I had to up-pot it to a 6 inch basket from 4 inch. On the other hand I had (and eventually lost) Sob. caloglossa which grew to about 15 ft (5 m) The "weedy" ones where I live are Sob. macarantha, its hybrids and relatives. (I think I lost Sob. caloglossa it because of waiting too long to repot when it needed it... too much of a physical challenge)

Here's Sob. callosa, for those who mioght want a Sobralia that fits on a windowsill.

Interesting and new to me. 15' yikes!

Andy Phillips claims that he got one of these monsters into a Prius (Not Sob caloglossa, too stiff, think it might have been S. mandonii which is a little more flexible with the stake removed).

That's the challenge for these tall ones... how does one get it home when one doesn't have a truck?

Can you just whack off the tops a couple of feet above the pot? I bet something that vigorous would come back from the roots.

Spoken like a true gardener.

Don't think so...I have never seen rooting on the stem. Not a Vanda...

No, I mean whack off and throw away the tops so the pot fits in the car. I bet it would come back from the roots.

I don't think so... certainly not in my lifetime.

In my experience with Sobralias, the roots and center knot of growth are more important than the twigs. I've saved a few that had been pretty badly damaged. If the roots were mostly OK they recovered fine. One had been growing in a toppled tree. The twigs were all crushed and mangled, but the roots were in good shape. I peeled the roots off the bark as best I could and tied it to my mango tree's trunk. Within a month or so I had several new shoots developing. That was a S. chrysostoma. But I've had similar experiences with others as well.

Wow. So I just did a little looking and these are expensive if you live in Florida. No one has them local (a little surprising) and it’s like $30 plus shipping for a seedling on a few websites. Are they similarly priced elsewhere?

I find some orchids are HUGELY geographically priced while others are not. Just curious.

This is a very cool genus

DC -
Cal Orchid sells a lot of these in 1-gallon pots, I think for around $25 or so... big husky, blooming-size plants. So it probably is geographic...on the other hand you have a bigger supply of Vandas... I'd expect that most Sobralias would do fine in Florida.

A couple years late to this discussion, but I can confirm sobralias can rejuvenate from the roots, as I once burned a Sob. decora plant so bad it lost all it's leaves and even burned the ends of of most of the canes. It's now filling a 3 gallon pot.