Paph. sanderianum

Good one Gilda! Very funny post....

What takes it so long? I mean....12 YEARS??? I will never be that paitient.

Unfortunately, all 'Deep Pocets' x 'Jacob's Ladder' are PEOY, there has been a big mess with this cross at the Orchid Zone.

From what I understand, the first Deep Pockets x Jacob's Ladder were true sanderianum, but there was a very limited supply of seedlings. The subsequent releases, which were far more substantial, were PEOYs, and not good ones at that.

Peter: I have a book "Slipper Orchids of Borneo", and under sanderianum habitat it lists, "Paph sanderianum grows in the wild on vertical north-east or east facing limestone cliffs from 50 to 300 m elevation in places that are in deep shade for most of the day, receiving diffuse sunlight only in the morning." The only in situ plant of sanderianum that I have seen a photograph of was very large and had the typical ratty leaves of a plant in the wild, but the leaves were dark green. That was a specimen from Mulu National Park in Borneo.

Hi Jason,

I also have the same book (great in-situ pics). I remember seeing a picture or two of some wild sanderianums and some of the leaves were tip burnt, chewed and looked very yellow in the sun. I may even have a pic on one of my extra hard drives if I can find it. I remember seeing some were growing on vertical rocky cliffs and some were closer to the ground. The ones higher up were the ones with yellowish leaves.

I guess there's probably some variation to be expected in wild plants--they just grow wherever they can gain a foothold. The one pic I saw was on the back cover of the AOS mag a few years ago...I scanned it onto my HD but it's about 1 MB in size. There were at least 3 *big* clumps, with 1-2 spikes from each. The leaves were medium to dark green but had those ratty brown spots...

Yes, I believe there are many variations even among many other different species for example Paph lowii, some grow on tree tops where they get more direct sun and then some grow in more shaded areas below the tree top level.

Great. More misidentification. Yet another case of "wait till it blooms to see if it really is what they said it was." Never mind the passage of years. This problem seems to be going around quite a bit lately...

Yeah, tell me about it! I just went through the same thing with my "parishii". Very frustrating!

Louis, if you have one of those, I hear from the grapevine that true sandy has a tiny yellow picotee to the leaf edges. And while we're at it, delenatii fma. dunkel has a thin red/magenta picotee. Anyone here with a sandy see confirmation of that?