I just noticed something interesting on this dendrobium.
Before I pollinated the flowers, the cane had the existing spike with open flowers and two new emerging spikes that were less than an inch long.

After I pollinated some of the flowers and some ovaries are starting to swell, the new spikes on that cane all dried up.
The new spikes on the other canes (not pollinated) are still alive and growing.

Do you think that the death of the new spikes were a result of the pollination?
Perhaps the cane decided that it no longer needed to produce new flowers for the season since the first batch of flowers has done their job already?
Or perhaps it aborted the new spikes in order to focus energy on feeding the seed pods?


Also, I took some pollen from a couple of flowers but did not pollinate them in return.
Those flowers also have dried up and fallen. I'm thinking that this is because there is no more pollen in those flowers, the plant decided to drop them in order to prevent those barren flowers from diverting potential pollinators away from the viable flowers.

Interesting stuff

~John