Phrag. longifolium var Dariense

[Dorsetman]

I bought this at a Society sale - paid a lot (ouch !) for a single growth - got carried away by the romance of the Darien Gap, I guess - which is where this came from. Was warned that it didn't like to be a single growth, wouldn't flower until I filled a pot.... 3 years later my single growth is now filling a 10 inch pot, and I have five spikes . here is the first flower... rarher a disappointment. Now if I can only find five suckers to pay me, what I paid, for each of the flowering growths , I should be $200 better off... if only !

maybe someone will tell me they like it ? Make me feel better, that would ?

[RedEcho]

Ouch.....I am shocked by the flower and the price.

[JDT]

Geoff, I like everything you have, yes the price was high but why save the money for the kids, spend it while you can.

[orchidsal]

Whats not to like? Anything with five spikes sounds like success to me. AL

[Brutal_Dreamer]

Whats not to like? Anything with five spikes sounds like success to me. AL

Amen! Lovely slipper bloom, Geoff. Looks like a huge, healthy orchid plant!

Cheers,
BD

[TwoStems]

I think it's lovely! And if I had the money I'd buy it off you hahaha!

[jrfehon]

Beautiful, healthy phrag! Congrats on such an amazing orchid!

-Jason

[Dorsetman]

It is growing on me. as more flowers open , and have a slightly mor interesting shape and better colour too ; I'll post another pic when there are several spikes in flower.

[kiwiorchids]

ooh thats nice! its foliage looks like a cymbidium? is it part of the Cymbidiaea tribe?

[Dorsetman]

ooh thats nice! its foliage looks like a cymbidium? is it part of the Cymbidiaea tribe?

Its a slipper orchid ; I can assume that some primitive early slipper orchid was present in Gondwanaland - the single continent which existed before the mass split up and the continents separated and migrated around the globe. The plants in the Americas evolved into Phrags ( and Mexipediums) also Selenipedium ( why does no-one grow Selenipedium ? Lovely big orchids, leaves five foot long , a flower spike even longer , dozens of flowers, all the size of a bee .....the colour - can't remember , nothing very special anyway...ahah, thats why ! )
Of course apart from Phrags, those primitive plants in the more tropical parts of the land mass which became Asia and Oceania, evolved into Paphs , and those in the northern part ( remembering that Asia and North America remained joined for a long time until separated by the formtion of the Bering Strait, ) became Cyprepedium - which are spread around the world in the northern hemisphere.

End of paleological lecture... I wonder how far experts would agree with my dissertation which is based solely on Darwinian principles and logic ? But after all, no-one was there to watch it happening, so I am as right as anyhone could be, perhaps.