Wrongly named Paph trend.

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That's exactly what the seller expect. The plants are "so cheap" that there is no complain, so they can still make profit, and do more scam. If I offer you a sanderianum blooming size at 6$, and it turns out to be a St Swithin, you will not be too angry. Yet I would make profit, because no one wanted to buy those St Swithin, even at 4$.

Sanderianum. you are right in what you say here except that we have very few Retail Nurseries selling Paphs now and because of the smallish number of Orchid growers, word gets around very quickly if a nursery sells wrongly named plants. Mistakes do happen but not on a regular basis, if it does then the seller doesn't sell to many more plants. The nursery these came from no longer sell Paphs. One other nursery that mainly sold imported paphs had the highest return of wrong named Paphs in Australia. No longer in business, health problems mainly I believe. There is one thing, a nursery is now offering to import Paph flasks from In-Charm off their catalog, what chance is there of correctness there???
 
Sanderianum. you are right in what you say here except that we have very few Retail Nurseries selling Paphs now and because of the smallish number of Orchid growers, word gets around very quickly if a nursery sells wrongly named plants. Mistakes do happen but not on a regular basis, if it does then the seller doesn't sell to many more plants. The nursery these came from no longer sell Paphs. One other nursery that mainly sold imported paphs had the highest return of wrong named Paphs in Australia. No longer in business, health problems mainly I believe. There is one thing, a nursery is now offering to import Paph flasks from In-Charm off their catalog, what chance is there of correctness there???

Yes, but from my experience, after a while, people have to buy again from the sellers, no matter how bad they are. There is a kind of monopoly in many countries, where there are not that many retail nurseries.

In-Charm Orchids is quite reliable. There have been some hiccups, like some flasks of sand In Charm x Shin-Yi that turned out to be hybrids (many of that cross actually). They exchange pollen with several others people, so there may be a problem.

All the nurseries have had their mess, at a time or another Even Tokyo Orchid Nurseries, they sold fake Val x MM rothschildianum, that turned out to be St Swithin. They replaced without any questions when it has been realized. I think that the reliability of the nursery lies as well in its replacement policy. If the plants are not true to name, they must replace or refund, now or 10 years later when the plants bloom.

On another note, I know perfectly well as well that many, if not most, of the taiwanese nurseries have another type of "fake" plants.

The obvious is one hybrid instead of a sprecies, or one hybrid instead of another one. That's fine.

The not obvious is hybrids or species with different parents. Roth Charles E x Borneo sold as Rex x Mt Millais ( there are plenty around in the USA actually), that kind of story. They bloom, they are rothschildanum, so no one can complain. It is just "bad luck" if the plant has ugly flowers, but no one can quarel about the parentage.

I know it happens quite frequently. I like to get very selected plants, or rare forms. I know the history of quite a few plants, and when I see in Taiwan that they offer flasks of plants that I have seen last year in poor condition ( there are hangianum flasks like that, I have seen the "motherplant" pictured in Da Lat, and the Taiwanese that bought it. There is NO WAY he could sell flasks right now of its progeny). I passed sometimes pollen of my plants, along with a picture, to several breeders. Sometimes they had flasks of the progeny available within a very, very few months. They offered them to people unrelated to me, but unfortunately some are close friends, and forwarded me their emails offering crosses from my plant. It was a quite famous paph breeder, that disappointed me a lot with such practices.

Another example, I asked for fairrieanum album and normal ones selected from the Orchid Zone. A famous US paph seller, very popular, who was coming to Europe went to the Orchid Zone, and told me he forgot to take picture, but "here it is", with the flower stem cuts. I trusted him. When I rebloomed them after 6 months, I realized that first, some were not from the Orchid Zone, second, none of them were selected. At 500-1000$ a plant, it is a "little bit" expensive. They were exactly the same quality as the ones sold at the same time for US$25-30 on Ebay. I ordered 3 plants at 800-1000$ of the type that has a synsepalum similar to the dorsal. They bloomed as crappy fairrieanum, borderline pot-plant quality ( and no mirror dorsal !). What could I say? Nothing at all of course. But I have quite a large collection of fairrieanum, and I know perfectly well that the growing conditions were perfect! And anyway the mirror dorsal appear, whether the growing conditions are good or not. I have seen he sold sanderianum divisions "selected ones", that were just normal plants, and I got screwed up like hell with an emersonii album division that bloomed like a normal plant. He claimed that "maybe I inverted the tags". No way, I care of everything alone and myself. There are many stories.

Now, what I think about orchid hobbyists and professionals. I learned the "hard way" that making pot-plant flasks, or crosses is difficult, and has to be managed Army style. The price of the mother plant is that, the costs of everything is that, the result costs that, sold that, the profit is that.

As for any kind of activity, it is a "business". Some people are fair, some are unfair. But all the sellers have to think as follow:

"I put 10$ on the table to buy this, the market retail price is 20$, they are a little bit better, but I have competitors. So I sell 18$."

It is all about money investment and profit, many sellers have to think like that, or they collapse. So some can sell real Vuitton, some will think that mixing up some fake ones will increase the profit, and some will think that selling only fake ones as genuine will make a big, beautiful box full of cash. All people who buy orchids must remember this. It is a business, like buying oranges or meat. That people love orchids make no difference, it is and remain a business. Which means as well that if the retailers can have a "very good deal" from a wholesaler, they will think about the profit first, then the risks ( fake or not fake? How many will die if they are fake before they bloom? How much to refund? Some people are unfortunately like that).
 
It is a hit and miss with all the nurseries. Even if you take Orchids Limited, that is an excellent nursery, if you were unlucky to buy one bellatulum album from one peculiar cross, one sanderianum Deep Pockets x Jacob's Ladder, and one paph zieckianum about 10 years ago, you would say they are the worst cheater you ever made. Yet, Orchids Limited got all of those plants from the Orchid Zone at that time. They are not responsible for what they resell ( though it seems Orchids Limited is breeding most of the paphs offered).

Now the aftercare, Orchids Limited would replace damaged/incorrectly named plants, some others nurseries would still have them on their pricelist, even today ( some companies did offer the fake orchid zone sands until about 3 years ago, knowingly !).


Was there a problem with bellatulum album and ziekianum from OZ at one time? I've seen and bought (about 10 yrs ago) several plants of each of these species and they were the true thing. I know the problem with the sanderianum. As far as I know, OZ went through all their invoices of every customer who had ever bought that cross from them and credited the full amount toward future purchases (and the customers get to keep the really nice PEoY).
 
Another example, I asked for fairrieanum album and normal ones selected from the Orchid Zone. A famous US paph seller, very popular, who was coming to Europe went to the Orchid Zone, and told me he forgot to take picture, but "here it is", with the flower stem cuts. I trusted him. When I rebloomed them after 6 months, I realized that first, some were not from the Orchid Zone, second, none of them were selected. At 500-1000$ a plant, it is a "little bit" expensive. They were exactly the same quality as the ones sold at the same time for US$25-30 on Ebay. I ordered 3 plants at 800-1000$ of the type that has a synsepalum similar to the dorsal. They bloomed as crappy fairrieanum, borderline pot-plant quality ( and no mirror dorsal !). What could I say? Nothing at all of course. But I have quite a large collection of fairrieanum, and I know perfectly well that the growing conditions were perfect! And anyway the mirror dorsal appear, whether the growing conditions are good or not. I have seen he sold sanderianum divisions "selected ones", that were just normal plants, and I got screwed up like hell with an emersonii album division that bloomed like a normal plant. He claimed that "maybe I inverted the tags". No way, I care of everything alone and myself. There are many stories.

Sorry to hear that sometimes you cannot trust the middle man too. In this case, why didn't you just buy the plants directly from OZ?
 
I can see how plants can be mislabelled. There are so many steps along the way that are open to errors (e.g. pollination, lab seed sowing, lab spreading, lab replating, deflasking, compotting, label printing, etc.). And for big commercial places, the probability of errors is even bigger. These places most likely have employees. So the mistakes are more likely made by the employees (who might not know anything about orchids or labelling or which plant is which) than the actual owner(s). Honest mistakes happen (even to reputable nurseries). What I'd liked to be aware of are the people who knowingly and purposely trying to deceive people (like the person who sold you the "select" fairrieanums). Those are the real crooks.
 
Paphlady, I'd start be re-reading Sanderianums posts, then have a look at the postings in the forum about wrong names and pics posted of Paphs where the names have been questioned by members. Sometimes a nurseryman maybe under the same idea that his/her plant name is correct at the time of breeding and may never get to know its wrong unless someone sees it and tells him or her. The problem is widespread, by choice or accident.
 
Was there a problem with bellatulum album and ziekianum from OZ at one time? I've seen and bought (about 10 yrs ago) several plants of each of these species and they were the true thing. I know the problem with the sanderianum. As far as I know, OZ went through all their invoices of every customer who had ever bought that cross from them and credited the full amount toward future purchases (and the customers get to keep the really nice PEoY).

Yes, the zieckianum were a hybrid of zieckianum x violascens, or papuanum (botanical name of zieckianum) x papuanum(horticultural name of violascens). That was most likely a pollen mistake. They were sold as zieckianum "True Type" x sib.

A picture from Orchids Limited is still available here:

http://web.archive.org/web/20020818204145/www.orchidweb.com/cat_dtl.asp?P_Recno=2387

Clearly showing the hybrid.

For bellatulum album, some were bellatulum album x ang-thong album. When selfing some of the bellatulum album, you end up with some long stemmed type ang thong album.

In both instances, I know that it was a non-intentional mistake, by using "outside" pollen to widen the genetic pool.

For the replacement, what I know about that:

-OZ replaced to several growers, but those growers (all commercial ones) nearly NEVER passed the refund to their hobbyists customers.

- OZ could not afford to replace the fake sands to Taiwanese nurseries. The owner of one of the largest Taiwan nursery, that I happen to know ( and bought the Michael Koopowitz Cuaranta for 25000US$, and many, many plants from the Orchid Zone), told me that because of the huge amount involved ( 10.000 fake sands if I remember, or 20.000 ? They invested a lot in Orchid Zone at that time), they have been offered a discount on their future purchase, 50% off the prices. They did not agree at all as far as I know, and OZ lost one of their largest, if not the largest customer. He was spending around 200-500.000US$/month about. Before the sanderianum problem, it was an "honor" to be an OZ customer, so the people never discussed the prices, or whatever. They had to pay cash in front, immediately, no delay, cannot "book a plant" without paying immediately. It was OZ Golden Age, where they could afford to be "touchy" and somewhat temperamental. So I think the Taiwanese was quite right to ask the full amount refund quickly, but it was of course a huge amount.

Sorry to hear that sometimes you cannot trust the middle man too. In this case, why didn't you just buy the plants directly from OZ?

The problem is that Terry does not like to make export CITES for "small orders", and I happened to learn shortly before that he had a batch of fairrieanum in bloom, including very selected ones. A commercial orchid grower from the USA that came to Europe offered to bring to me and a friend highly selected plants. He is quite famous in the USA actually.

I can see how plants can be mislabelled. So the mistakes are more likely made by the employees (who might not know anything about orchids or labelling or which plant is which) than the actual owner(s). Honest mistakes happen (even to reputable nurseries). What I'd liked to be aware of are the people who knowingly and purposely trying to deceive people (like the person who sold you the "select" fairrieanums). Those are the real crooks.

Definitely yes. OZ has had bad luck 3 times, that can happen to all the nurseries.

I happened actually to have bloomed very early a sand Deep Pocket x Jacob's Ladder that was a fake one (maybe I have been the first one to bloom one, then a Dutch nursery, then Ching Hua). I told OZ immediately, but they did not believe it, they went a little bit angry that I could question the identity of their best seller. A pity... The "official announcement" followed 2 years, and many plants sold, later.

So far, none of the sands sold by the Orchid Zone at that time turned out to be sanderianum, of any crosses. The invoices have been used actually to explain the origin of some "unrelated" plants.

If you reread my posts about fake fairrieanum, and others fake plants sold, you will find out quickly who he is...
 
The problem is that Terry does not like to make export CITES for "small orders", and I happened to learn shortly before that he had a batch of fairrieanum in bloom, including very selected ones. A commercial orchid grower from the USA that came to Europe offered to bring to me and a friend highly selected plants. He is quite famous in the USA actually.

...

If you reread my posts about fake fairrieanum, and others fake plants sold, you will find out quickly who he is...

Sanderianum,
I reread the "fake plants sold". I try to understand what this person did?
Did he switch plants, and keep the nice & special ones from OZ for himself, cut the stem from the true type that he kept to show you as sample flower?
I understand about the part of mis-identification of species from novice hobbists like myself if we make cross , or exchange pollen. (When I donate pollen, I send the recipient the photos of the flower, sometimes dimensions, sizes etc. so at least if I am wrong, the other person can make the decision whether the pollen should be used) But for experts, that is less of an excuse to be wrong. specially if with intention to misleading.
 
If you reread my posts about fake fairrieanum, and others fake plants sold, you will find out quickly who he is...

There wasn't much info in your post to let me even guess who this person might be. I'm just going to ask bluntly. So who is s/he?
 
Paphlady, I'd start be re-reading Sanderianums posts, then have a look at the postings in the forum about wrong names and pics posted of Paphs where the names have been questioned by members. Sometimes a nurseryman maybe under the same idea that his/her plant name is correct at the time of breeding and may never get to know its wrong unless someone sees it and tells him or her. The problem is widespread, by choice or accident.

True. The nurserymen must get their breeding plants from somewhere (especially species). They trust (like I would) the plants they bought are true.
 
The truth is sometimes people make mistakes, sometimes they are misleading and sometimes they are out right deceiving. I can tell you that nurseries fall into one of these categories or a mixture depending on different aspects of selling or who they are selling too.

Some lie about parents, lie about quality of parents, lie about the vigor, lie about the color and doctor photos, lie about the size, purposely sell the wrong plant of the same cross or even a different one. Change the breeding to make it their own using totaly different parents. Claim a cross they didn't make. These are all high crimes in my opinion especially if the lies are used to make sales and affect the truth of future breeding. Hybridizers rely somewhat on the honesty of those that came before them.

I can tell you that some nurserys are honest and forthright all the time and sometimes mistakes happen. That is why they are especially remembered when it happens to one of the respected forthright nurseries. Eveyone remembers the OZ incident with the sands and still talks about it because it was a mistake that happened at a nursery that is honestly and meticulously run. Just like anything else when a mistake happens through a sytems failure and not malice at any functioning insituition whether it be a nursery, a corporation, an airline, or a hospital the system is evaluated and improved to prevent further errors. Honest people like Terry admit they have made a mistake and then go back and try to prevent further mistakes by tweaking the system to prevent further ones. The OZ now rarely sells crosses that have never bloomed to the public. Terry is even so concerned he rarely sells divisions unless they are in bloom so people can see what they are getting.

It is the growers who through either purposeful ignorance or pure guile that we have to be aware of. Not the nursery at which one out of 50,000 crosses doesn't bloom true do to a pollination error. Something that will happen to everyone if they make enough crosses.

There are people blatantly cheating people. I can tell you that insituitions like the OZ don't purposely cheat or mislead anyone. There are also many other honest nurseries and people in the orchid world. They should be commended.
 
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There are people blatantly cheating people. I can tell you that insituitions like the OZ don't purposely cheat or mislead anyone. There are also many other honest nurseries and people in the orchid world. That is rare and should be commended.

I concur and would like to add Tokyo Orchid Nursery to the list of truly honest nurseries and people in the orchid world.
 

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