A Quick Glance At Stuff In Bloom

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mrhappyrotter

Grand Chupacabra
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This is just going to be a quick glance at many of the orchids that are currently in bloom. The busiest season is over, and I never got good photos of things this year, but it's still pretty busy on the stands. Most of these I've posted before when they bloomed in the past.

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Angreaecum didieri

This plant is almost constantly in bloom or bud since I've had it. Very vigorous and floriferous and of course the flowers are very fragrant around dusk and just after dark. Second bloom this month, and 1 or 2 new buds starting.

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Phrag. Cape May County 'Pizazz' x klotschianum

Small grower with small, delicate flowers. Many growths, 3 spikes. It's not fragrant, but I like it.

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Blurry Paph. liemianum

It's a lovely cochlopetalum species. Fairly compact grower and due to the sequential nature of the bloom spikes, it puts on a very long show!

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Phrag. longifolium

Standard sized species, meaning it's a big plant. The flowers are nice and it doesn't require as much light to bloom as I would have thought.

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Phal. Long Pride Goldstaff

This is a recent acquisition -- a tiny plant with small (but numerous) flowers. The main reason I bought it was for the unusual fragrance that seems to only be detectable from late morning to early afternoon. Hard to describe, but reminds me of a slightly chemically smell, perhaps the scent of a newly opened CD/DVD/Blu-ray or maybe a fresh opened pack of printing paper.

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Paph. Fairy Bird

It's a fowliei hybrid, which keeps the size down. Seems to be a reliable grower and bloomer, and while not classically pretty, I find the flowers to be interesting. I love the fairrieanum influence in the petals.

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Phrag. pearcei

This plant has literally been in bloom since last spring or summer. Spike after spike, flower after flower. And just as the old spikes started to retire, a new flush of at least 6 spikes appears.

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Phal. Cassandra

A pretty miniature Phal hybrid. Nicely mottled leaves. There's only 1 flower because I screwed up the spike. I like this because the flowers are fragrant around mid-day. It's fairly strong, it's more of a food or floral scent and very similar to my Albuca.

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Phrag. wallisii x Conchiferum

This is a really nice, fairly compact long petalled hybrid. It's easy to grow and blooms regularly. This is the second spike since the fall. It produces 4 - 5 flowers per spike.
 
Thank you, everyone.

Hey neighbor ! I like your shelf setup ! What lights are you using ? Nice collection of beautiful blooms !

Right now I grow mostly with 48 inch T8 retrofit LEDs, but I do still have some fluorescent lighting. I'm transitioning entirely to LED, but I'm only getting rid of the fluoros as they dim and die (I don't like to waste perfectly good stuff). I've also got a few stand alone LED systems I'm testing: one is equivalent in color and brightness to a 300 watt sodium vapor lamp, and I've got 2 different kinds of those red/pink/purple LED fixtures.

A couple years ago I started experimenting with LEDs and it's been very successful. I think the plants like LED more than fluorescent. I like the retrofit LED tubes that fit right into my 48 inch shop lights as a replacement for T8 fluoros.

I've tried a number of different brands, and surprisingly the ones I have the best luck with are also some of the cheapest. The LED retrofit bulbs I use are https://www.amazon.com/without-Ballast-Fluorescent-Replacement-Connection/dp/B00UNIJOR4. I like the clear coating, they seem brighter. I don't know the PAR values, but I know they are good enough to grow and bloom Phrags, Paphs, and my other plants. The bulbs are supposed to work with or without a ballast, but I've always had to remove the ballast from my shop light fixtures before they work.

Some of the other brands I've tried have been much more expensive, but they've all fallen short. One brand had an extremely high failure rate right out of the box (I buy in bulk). Another brand worked well for awhile, but the bulbs only lasted between 6 months and a year. Some brands have high failure rates of the individual LEDs. I've had some of these Sunco bulbs for almost 2 years, they've all arrived in perfect working order, none have burned out or died, and in all this time, only a single LED in one bulb has stopped working.
 

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