C. Callistoglossa doing well

I re-potted this large plant a couple of months ago.  Since then the pseudobulbs have been fairly shriveled.  I knew it had been putting out lots of new roots but it wasn't getting enough water.  Over the last two weeks all of a sudden the bulbs all plumped up, indicating the plant is happy. The pic shows the meaty bulbs on this large plant. I am growing my plants with C. warscewiczii ancestry indoors this winter under lights.  The same for my C. warneri.

C. labiata rubra buds

This plant has five buds on two stems - it will be a first bloom. It is doing well in a 6" wood basket. Its sibling bloomed last year but will not bloom this year as it suffered a setback when I moved it from a plastic basket to a pot.  However, it is now growing very well.

Use of methanol in plant feeding

A very interesting document.

New labiata looks a little better

The shape of the flower improved. Still looking for more improvement (and of course more flowers) next year.

Grow area

Compared to last year I have significantly more pots which means I can fit almost everything on the benches (many more plants were hanging last year). This is good because when watering hanging baskets it is difficult to control the amount of water falling on plants underneath. You can see some of my supplemental lighting on the left - still working on that and getting some more. Also you can see my oil-filled space heater - this is controlled by a Lux WIN100 thermostat.

A little bookkeeping

I found my old grow list from Fall 2009. I will update it when I have some more time. I was curious to see how many of the Cattleya and Laelia species plants I had at the time are still alive.  According to the list I had 64 plants. Of these, I gave away two and 23 are dead. I lose plants much less frequently these days.

Cattleya labiata first bloom

This is a seedling I imported from Bela Vista Orchids. It is still small and frankly I was shocked it decided to put out a flower (just one). The shape is poor, not surprising for a first bloom from an immature plant. The color is very nice. We'll see how it looks next year.

Cattleya labiata

This is the plant that I moved from a basket to a pot this summer.

Cattleya maxima

This plant has bloomed better in previous years (and I lost one bud to a snail).  As I noted in an earlier post, my maximas had a tough winter last year.  This is a very nice maxima and hopefully will have a better year next year.

C. Chocolate Drop