Corybas geminigibbus

[BrucherT]

Just wow. I love weird wild orchids. These culture methods are a revelation. Love to see more photos of folks’ methods. I won’t be growing these soon but I’m just fascinated. How do you ad cardboard to Paphs? What form? How much? Where? I’m all ears.

 

[BrucherT]

Charles, I hope that yours will grow well! And I'd like to see how yours look like.

I'm using a container for pre-washed spinach/salad from grocery store (about 10"Lx5"Wx4"H). 8 holes drilled on top and bottom. Mix is coarse perlite based with feather moss (and dome dirt) from backyard and a couple other minor components. I put quite a bit of corrugated cardboard pieces. I'm also using cactus mix + perlite=1:1 (with cardboard). Adding cardboard may not do anything, but it is a popular thing to do for terrestrial orchids in Japan. There is semi-quatitative experiment showing some benefit. No-one knows exact advantage. But people (and I) suspect that some of the cellulose degrading microbes are beneficial to orchids. I'm adding cardboard to other orchids including Paphs and Cyps in the last 2 years.

In the winter, it was 65/55F max/min temp (basically my cool-intermediate grow tent). They were kept moist. Actually, I didn't know if they are alive or dead, so I didn't pay much attention, but I just kept watering every 2-4 weeks.

I didn't bury the tubers. When I put them, moss hasn't grown yet, so I just placed them on the media. For the ones which had roots already, I lightly covered the root (you can kind of see it in Aug 2015 photo).

I put more details in my blog post, and I'm using similar method as TommyMiami of OB (he is mostly hanging out in FB, now): http://www.orchidboard.com/community/orchids-in-bloom/84403-corybas-geminigibbus.html

By the way, did you (Eric, Charles?) get both C. geminigibbus and C. calopeplos? Do the leaves look different? The paper I linked in my blog has nice photos of these two species in situ. The leaves of C. calopeplos is really different looking. My C. calopelos was mislabelled, so all of mine turned out to be C. geminigibbus. I'm wondering if they really have C. calopelos. I'll probably try to pick it up if they have it for Redland.

As a side note, it is interesting that C. geminigibbus of IOSPE looks like a different species.

Love to hear more specifics on the cardboard-for-Paphs thing. How? Where? How much? What form? Thank you.

 

[naoki]

I'm not adding cardboard recently. I had a flask of P. gratrixiam, which I put pieces of corrugated cardboard to a half of them. The sample size was small (about 7 per treatment), so I didn't get statistically significant differences (I think p-value was around 0.07), but the ones with cardboard pieces were smaller after 2 years or so. I added a couple 1-2" cardboard pieces at the bottom of 2.25" pot (standing up, so it isn't blocking the drainage holes). You can experiment, too.

 

[emydura]

That is such a neat flower. It is a pity it isn't as easy to grow as the Australian Corybad species, but you seem to have mastered the culture.

 

[Ozpaph]

well done

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Nice to see they are still growing and flowering for you. I never seem to make it past year 3 with these. I think part of the problem is I have them in too cold conditions in winter.