Phalaenopsis pulchra

[Paul]

Hello,
This one hadn't bloomed for two years, now it's done... but only 2 buds and many many kekis

I really don't understand what makes the plant bloom!

 

[likespaphs]

wow. nice color

 

[JeanLux]

Paul, congratulations for that performance, and thanks for reminding me of how those flowers look like!!! I have some of them, and as you remarked: many keikis but no blooms! Jean

Does anybody have a method to bring them to bloom????

 

[Yoyo_Jo]

Cool - great color!

 

[Corbin]

Nice flower. I've not tried this species yet.

 

[charlie c]

Paul, congratulations for that performance, and thanks for reminding me of how those flowers look like!!! I have some of them, and as you remarked: many keikis but no blooms! Jean

Does anybody have a method to bring them to bloom????

Under the heading of FWIW, I've had a plant for a number of years. Long enough that it came in labeled as Phal. lueddemanniana var.pulchra.

Over the years I've tried several things to see if I could encourage flowering. Thinking that the production of keikis might mean that the plant was being overfed and opting to reproduce vegetatively rather than sexually, I cut back on the feeding regimen. Didn't make much difference. More light, less light; again not much difference. The only factor that I've seen consistently is that it seems to flower rather than produce keikis (or at least more flowers than keikis) when summers are cooler than normal.

Wonder if members who grow indoors in AC, or in a GH with cooling in the summer have better results than we do?

charlie c

 

[Gilda]

I kept mine on the dry side(or in other words I forgot to water them) on our covered deck. Fertilzed sporadically, and they bloomed pretty good . You know if a plant thinks it's dying(ie from lack of water) it blooms !They no longer abide with me though.
Ed. M grows one mounted and it blooms great...maybe he will pitch in his growing secrets !

 

[Elena]

Wow, sensational colour!

 

[Paul]

I'm growing my pulchra into the greenhouse with low light (on the floor, under other plants)
Last year the summer what the coolest, darkest and most humid ever here but I had no blooms.
This summer was better but I let the temperature drop to 12°C during the cool nights a few weeks ago.
BUT a friend of I grows 3 pulchra indoor in a city with quite hot summers, and his 3 are now in bloom... and one is a keiki from my plant that I sent him last spring. lol

 

[biothanasis]

great colour!!!! Fantastic!

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

I had this plant in Florida and like everybody else, I got lots of keikis. I finally broke down and planted the whole mess into a vanda basket and let it do its thing - it got huge! Flowering was never abundant, but I do remember at least 20 flowers on it at a time, always in the summer/fall months. I grew it under hot, humid conditions in summer (May-September), and much cooler conditions in winter.

 

[swamprad]

A friend gave me a keikei of this species a couple of weeks ago. The keikei was in bud! I know I should have snipped off the bud, but I didn't. I planted it and the flower is going to open in a day or so.

 

[SlipperFan]

I had a pulchra -- a nice one when it bloomed. But it typically only had one bloom. But they love to keiki!