# Paph. hirsutissimum



## jblanford (Feb 24, 2008)

I've been waiting 5 years for this one to pop, last year it had a sheath but blasted. This year it has two flowers and they get better looking each day. Thanks for looking. Jim.


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## Yoyo_Jo (Feb 24, 2008)

Oh my, that is beautiful. Congrats! 5 years is a long time to wait...:clap:


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## Corbin (Feb 24, 2008)

Love the color combination. good growing


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## NYEric (Feb 24, 2008)

Worth the wait congrats!


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## Rick (Feb 24, 2008)

This one has large well presented petals. How long has the flower been open?

If the petals stay in this presentation I'd say this is a showable flower.

The petals are prone to allot of twisting and reflexing in this species.


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## Park Bear (Feb 24, 2008)

congrats....looks great


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## Roy (Feb 24, 2008)

I have a feeling you should put the variety name 'esquirolei' on the label as well. And not a bad form of it either.


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## SlipperKing (Feb 24, 2008)

I'm no expert but if the picture is true, the unopen bud doesn't show excessive hairs on the ovary, peduncle or the bud itself then Roy is right. It's most likely Paph hirsutissimum var. esquirolei.


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## JeanLux (Feb 25, 2008)

Pretty flowers! Jean


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## jblanford (Feb 25, 2008)

The tag on this plant reads P. hirsutissimum "Peter" X 
P. hirsutissimum "Sunrise". I'm not sure where Var- Esquirolei comes in. The first flower has been open for one week the second just a couple of days. I hope they 
will last until the Green Bay WI. show next week-end.
Thanks Jim.


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## Rick (Feb 25, 2008)

I think allot of people got tired of trying to differentiate the nominal form from the variety. This one is really a matter of splitting hairsoke:oke:

Jim, I'd love to get some pollen from this flower after you're done showing it.

Rick


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## Berrak (Feb 25, 2008)

That was worth waiting for. I have 2 that I have been waiting for since 2002.
I hope they will bloom next winter.


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## Rick (Feb 25, 2008)

Berrak said:


> That was worth waiting for. I have 2 that I have been waiting for since 2002.
> I hope they will bloom next winter.



Berrak 
Check for sheaths now. Mine typically put up sheaths in Fall, but hold them through the winter. The spikes on mine are just starting to poke up now, and by April I should have quite a few blooms open.


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## biothanasis (Feb 25, 2008)

As I can see it was worth the waiting!!!! Congratulations!!!!!!


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## tusker (Feb 25, 2008)

Very nice.

How many growths does that plant have?


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## Roy (Feb 26, 2008)

Jim, the main characteristics I look for and see in yours are, flower color, size of flower, lack of hairs on the top edge of the petals, petal size, color and shape, dorsal shape and pouch color. The previous owner may have just left the 'Esquirolei' out for some reason.


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## jblanford (Feb 26, 2008)

OK... To answer a few questions, Rick you can have all the pollen you need, but you'll have to walk me through the process I've never done that before. As for growths their are 2 with flowers, 2 others good size, and 1 just starting to come out. Roy when I get some time I'll check the flowers with a magnifier. Thanks Jim.


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## NYEric (Feb 26, 2008)

Rick said:


> I think allot of people got tired of trying to differentiate the nominal form from the variety. This one is really a matter of splitting hairsoke:oke:
> 
> Rick


Oh, I get it!


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## jblanford (Feb 26, 2008)

I also have another P. hirsutissimum. in spike now but the plant looks different smaller and darker leaves almost molted like. I'll post a pic when it blooms. I got it at a soceity auction so not sure if it's tagged right. Jim.


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## SlipperFan (Feb 26, 2008)

Very nice, indeed.


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## SlipperKing (Feb 26, 2008)

I did a web search and found what I believe to be Paph hirsutissimum var. hirsutissimum, clone 'Peter'. This may very well be the pod parent of Jim's plant. Ernie might be able to shed some light on the parents. I see he has the same cross listed on his website.


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## goldenrose (Feb 27, 2008)

It's a beauty!


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## Hien (Feb 28, 2008)

SlipperKing said:


> I did a web search and found what I believe to be Paph hirsutissimum var. hirsutissimum, clone 'Peter'. This may very well be the pod parent of Jim's plant. Ernie might be able to shed some light on the parents. I see he has the same cross listed on his website.



Mesmerizing...
thanks for the photo.


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## Ernie (Feb 28, 2008)

I haven't seen enough of both varieties bloom to say I'm confident "splitting the hairs" between v hir and v esq. Sorry. Our 'Enlightened' clone is very similar to Jim's flower but has more horizontal petals. In both cases the petals are extremely wide and well-held! It is either a sibling of Jim's plant or shares the 'Peter' clone as a parent- I forget off hand. I might be able to give more info early next week- I'll see Jim's plant in Green Bay. 

-Ernie


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## Rick (Feb 28, 2008)

I would also consider that hirsutisimum has one of the largest ranges of paphs in Vietnam and into south China. var hursutisimum is supposed to come from higher elevations (cooler temps) than its lowland version (esquirolei). Other than hairs the amount of variation we are seeing is probably just an artifact of limited sampling of a couple of discreet populations. You could take just about any low dispersion species in a rainforest. Jump from one hill to the next and find something slightly different again. I think Averyanov has seen a fair amount of variability in the Vietnamese populations he's studied.

Also the hairier plant makes sense for the higher altitude version since it does help in frost abatement.


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## Bob Wellenstein (Feb 28, 2008)

Once you've seen the two they are pretty easy to tell apart, true hirsut is like a bottle brush with short hairs. I've never seen anything intermediate. Also, at least in cultivation in our hands and the same with people we have talked to, P hirsutissimum sets its buds in the early fall and holds them until late spring, and as a result is harder to bloom, while the variety pushes the bud up right away.


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## Ernie (Feb 28, 2008)

Bob Wellenstein said:


> Once you've seen the two they are pretty easy to tell apart, true hirsut is like a bottle brush with short hairs. I've never seen anything intermediate. Also, at least in cultivation in our hands and the same with people we have talked to, P hirsutissimum sets its buds in the early fall and holds them until late spring, and as a result is harder to bloom, while the variety pushes the bud up right away.



Now that's the factoid of the day IMO. Thanks Bob! Ours does the hold thing as does Jim's I believe. Will seek out v esq to get a real frame of reference. Gotta admit we've ruined more sheathed buds than flowers we've seen from carelessness watering in the winter. 

-Ernie


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## Rick (Feb 28, 2008)

Bob Wellenstein said:


> Once you've seen the two they are pretty easy to tell apart, true hirsut is like a bottle brush with short hairs. I've never seen anything intermediate. Also, at least in cultivation in our hands and the same with people we have talked to, P hirsutissimum sets its buds in the early fall and holds them until late spring, and as a result is harder to bloom, while the variety pushes the bud up right away.



Do you mean sheaths or buds (in sheaths). I have an esquirolei, and that's typical for it to start sheaths in fall, but bud / spike development is now into spring.

One year though after a typical blooming (fall-spring) it sent up sheaths in late spring that spiked about a month later as you describe, but that was atypical for mine out of about 5 years.


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## jblanford (Feb 28, 2008)

Both flowers are open now and they look just great, but the sad news is our show-person became ill so we are not sending plants to the Green Bay show. I'll just have to enjoy them here at home. Thanks for looking. Jim.


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## Ernie (Feb 29, 2008)

Yeah, I heard Wilda is ill.  For Pete's sake, Jim, get that plant inside before it freezes solid! 

-Ernie


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## Rick (Feb 29, 2008)

As long as they are not out in the snow (like it looks in your pictureoke you should get to enjoy these blooms for a long time.

I'll pm you about pollen.


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## Roth (Feb 29, 2008)

It is not the case for that one, but in Europe Floricultura about 20 years ago made a huge batch of esquirolei x esquirolei, esquirolei x hirsutissimum, and esquirolei x villosum ( latter is irrelevant for that thread), that went to the pot plant trade. As with the Pinocchio yellow sold as primulinum, it is quite likely many plants are around. I will try to ask them pics to see how it looked like, just out of curiosity, especially the hairs on the stem.

Post said they made about 20.000 for several growers at that time, they gathered as many esquirolei hirsutissimum villosum, and insigne as they could, and made many seed caps. 

They did as well helenae x barbigerum much more recently that is now widespread in Europe and very difficult to tell apart from the real helenae. And they are not "cheaters". They do it for pot-plant. After, if some people are courageous enough to buy unlabeled plants from their shelves, and put a species tag, that's another matter.

Many villosum in Europe come from Clements nursery in the Netherlands, that store ( apart from gorgeous vietnamense seedlings, with fantastic blooms) many fake praestans ( Deena Nicol x praestans) and villosum ( unknown, but villosum x gratrix or something along the line), that they supply to Cameleon Orchids for their 'Mixed Box' pot plant offer. There is always a risk of 'fake' species nowadays (and that's why it is best to buy from breeders who have their own parental stock, and know the source of their parents, rather than through several trades).

Clements as well got a wild philippinense album that they selfed, still for the pot plant trade. Philippinense album 'Albino Beauty' AM/AOS comes from that nursery actually (and pot-plant priced, by the pot size, like a Maudiae or Pinnochio), and many gorgeous philippinense album. ( and Orchid Inn does not know the source, having bought it from a middleman). Now the owner has absolutely no more unfortunately (but last year he had about 200 tigrinum blooming size from seed... Sold out immediately as well).


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## SlipperFan (Feb 29, 2008)

200, and sold out immediately! Oh, my!


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## Roy (Feb 29, 2008)

Sanderianum, your posting has answered a number of questions I had regarding these two plants hirsut' & esquirolei, its going to almost impossible to tell exactly which one you have. I have seen one flowering plant of hirsut' v hirsut x esquirolei?? and it was intermediate between the two for color, size & shape of segments. I'm not sure about the hairs though. The flower stem was extremely long. No pics unfortunately. Do you know of any genuine wild colored esquirolei PICS of the flowers???


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## Roth (Mar 1, 2008)

Roy said:


> Sanderianum, your posting has answered a number of questions I had regarding these two plants hirsut' & esquirolei, its going to almost impossible to tell exactly which one you have. I have seen one flowering plant of hirsut' v hirsut x esquirolei?? and it was intermediate between the two for color, size & shape of segments. I'm not sure about the hairs though. The flower stem was extremely long. No pics unfortunately. Do you know of any genuine wild colored esquirolei PICS of the flowers???



I know for sure that esquirolei Taka, Atlas, the Reserve Grand Champion of the WOC are wild collected, genuine ones ( and sister plants). Most esquirolei actually are "genuine", because the original wild collected stock has been divided for years. I think nearly all plants available in the USA, except imported from Europe, then I would be careful. All the alba esquirolei are genuine, nearly all originate from a single man in China, and are divisions of old wild collected plants (K.K. Crystal River is one of his plants originally, but without that clonal name).

Hirsutissimum is a very rare species in cultivation now compared to esquirolei. There are not that many wild collected plants available, and anyway, people are not "that interested" in esquirolei and hirsutissimum. The massive esquirolei like Taka, and the albino have resurrected interest in that species, but before it was very far from a "best seller"...


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## Roy (Mar 1, 2008)

Thanks Sanderianum. This is my Esquirolei which I haven't had all that long but on checking, the seller actually brought it back from Asia, he said it was a collected plant and not a seedling but thats debatable I suppose. The flower is old and marked but the best of the 3 on the plant.


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## Hien (Mar 1, 2008)

I know that everybody is going to yell at me for being political incorrect again.
But after reading so many well researched posts with backing up data from Sanderianum, I really want to stand next to the forest edge and waiting for the tribesmen to bring out the collected plants.
I don't mind hybrids, I just hate to buy a plant (hybrids or species) that is not what it supposed to be.
Because of all of this carelessness, I doubt that any of the hybrids we own actually true to the formula registered in RHS.


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## SlipperFan (Mar 1, 2008)

Now that's a discouraging statement!


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## NYEric (Mar 1, 2008)

Hien said:


> Because of all of this carelessness, I doubt that any of the hybrids we own actually true to the formula registered in RHS.


I'm with you Hien, so everybody send me all your besseae and Parvi hybrids!


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## Roth (Mar 2, 2008)

Sorry, 



Sanderianum said:


> Most esquirolei actually are "genuine", because the original wild collected stock has been divided for years. I think nearly all plants available in the USA, except imported from Europe, then I would be careful.



Nearly all plants available in the USA are genuine, except imported from Europe...



Hien said:


> I know that everybody is going to yell at me for being political incorrect again.
> But after reading so many well researched posts with backing up data from Sanderianum, I really want to stand next to the forest edge and waiting for the tribesmen to bring out the collected plants.
> I don't mind hybrids, I just hate to buy a plant (hybrids or species) that is not what it supposed to be.
> Because of all of this carelessness, I doubt that any of the hybrids we own actually true to the formula registered in RHS.



It is very true. There are a few species where hybrids have spoiled heavily the gene pool. Some example:

- I have bought plants from Mu Orchids, very reputed grower of leucochilum. Those were unbloomed seedlings. None of them turned out to be leucochilum, they had all some niveum, or bellatulum inside, does not matter the cross he sold to me. Even some of his "selected concolor" with flat round flowers are hybrids, they have special batches to make those selected concolors, and when they bloom they throw away all the ang-thong and bellatulum looking ones. Most of the gene pool in Thailand for the "selected" leucochilum, niveum, ang-thong and concolor is corrupt by other species.

- Callosum, barbatum, superbiens ( quite a few Cymatodes x superbiens, or superbiens x curtisii around)

- Many insigne, gratrixianum, villosum

- A lot of large praestans from seed from Europe ( they are actually a backcross of praestans on roth x praestans)

- All the large flowered primulinum and glaucophyllum are in fact screened plant from a Dutch pot-plant nursery. Same for the primulinum "4N" ( I did some, and the leaves are still narrow). Even the primulinum bred by the Orchid Zone before were that pot-plant hybrid. They got their plant through an english middleman that went to Netherlands to pick up those fake primulinum and sell at premium price along with rothschildianum album seedlings, Eric Young divisions, roth Mt Millais selfing passed as divisions, primulinum 4n, esquirolei Taka FCC/AOS x self (Taka is borderline sterile actually, yield only a few seedlings. It is a 3n plant)...

- Many liemianum as well are in fact hybrids

- glaucophyllum album is another Pinnochio yellow that had the luck to have glaucous leaves. It has been selfed, but in the selfing there were some seedlings with dark green leaves. Tossed out.

- Some of the esquirolei, some philippinense ( I think Birdy can show picture of an hybrid from Netherlands that looks like a philippinense), now lowii, haynaldianum...

- jackii, and malipoense, with the hybrids populations around...

- tranlienianum 'red' ( there are very few wild plants that do exist, actually), most of the ones in the trade are coccineum x tranlienianum

- very soon the red type of hangianum, a lot of emersonii x hangianum start to bloom, some very difficult to tell apart from hangianum.

Those are just the few examples I am thinking about right now.

The other problem is that the growers who keep record of their parent stock, and do everything internally, like AnTec or the Orchid Zone, know the history of the parents they use. The people who resell Taiwanese stock or European stock have absolutely NO CLUE as how the parent looks like. But the former cannot compete with the latter at all, in terms of price. And many hobbyists will go for the cheaper source anyway.



Roy said:


> Thanks Sanderianum. This is my Esquirolei which I haven't had all that long but on checking, the seller actually brought it back from Asia, he said it was a collected plant and not a seedling but thats debatable I suppose. The flower is old and marked but the best of the 3 on the plant.



If he brought it back from Asia, it is esquirolei. Esquirolei is :

- Not a plant worth anything in Asia, so making seedlings would be like US people making dandelion seedlings...
- Not much in demand anyway. Except some selected varieties, the flowers are a little bit "boring". 
- Quite difficult to germinate quickly and abundantly. That's something very funny, as there are literally hundreds of thousands of plants in some single colonies. I found out that quite a few species ( micranthum, hangianum, esquirolei, tigrinum, emersonii, randsii) germinate very quickly and very well on wild seeds, then the next year, they germinate OK, and the next year, they do not yield many seedlings, if at all. I guess it has something to do with mineral nutrition of the mother plants. Anyway.

On the other side, esquirolei x hirsutissimum, or esquirolei x tranlienianum germinate very quickly and heavily. Same stands true for helenae, the pure species yield not that many protocorms, but helenae x barbigerum has a very high yield.


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## Roy (Mar 2, 2008)

Sanderianum, following on from your comments, I see some extremely good shaped and large P. spicerianums. Could there be a problem there as well?? I mean by hybridists back crossing spicerianum onto P. Bruno 'Model', which in itself is a spicerianum hybrid but looks very much like spicerianum only larger and flatter with the dorsal not reflexing as much or at all like a true spicerianum.


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## Roth (Mar 2, 2008)

Roy said:


> Sanderianum, following on from your comments, I see some extremely good shaped and large P. spicerianums. Could there be a problem there as well?? I mean by hybridists back crossing spicerianum onto P. Bruno 'Model', which in itself is a spicerianum hybrid but looks very much like spicerianum only larger and flatter with the dorsal not reflexing as much or at all like a true spicerianum.



Most of them are Bruno, if not all. The Taiwanese got a large batch of Bruno ('Model' is one of them, but there were several around), and make a lot of crosses. They sell the progeny as spicerianum at present time. It is easy to spot, spicerianum, whilst a beautiful species in its own, has extremely rarely a 'nearly flat' dorsal.

We had a batch of spicerianum "Giganteum" as well in Europe that was an old hybrid from a vintage orchid nursery in the Netherlands, specialized in cut flowers... They have been scattered all around the world since the end of the 80's approximately.


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## Hien (Mar 2, 2008)

Sanderianum said:


> Sorry,
> 
> 
> It is very true. There are a few species where hybrids have spoiled heavily the gene pool. Some example:
> ...



Oh! the name MU somehow jumps out, sure enough I check on Slipperorchidforum. there was a thread about leucochilum. In it Papuanum mentioned exact the same scenario.

http://www.slipperorchidforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9258&highlight=leucochilum&page=3

The hangianums with a lot of red on the dorsal & petals in the Slipperorchid of Taiwan IV, are they hybrids?

The dandelions statement is so funny, didn't Leonid say they are on the verge of being critical threaten near the end of the book?
Maybe I remember it wrongly.


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## Roth (Mar 2, 2008)

Hien said:


> Oh! the name MU somehow jumps out
> 
> The hangianums with a lot of red on the dorsal & petals in the Slipperorchid of Taiwan IV, are they hybrids?
> 
> ...



Well, MU or many others, they have a "trend" in Thailand to rename quickly seedlings to suit the customers as well. I had a lot of disappointement buying unbloomed plants and flasks. Sometimes the cheap flask on Jatujak market would yield nicer and real leucochilum than the 150$ flasks.

The hangianum in Slipper Orchid of Taiwan are real ones, but they are not very common at all. In fact, they are quite rare, not like an albino, but not very far. I would say that randomly out of 1000 hangianum blooming, maybe 20 will be red, and 10 with nice shape.

About Leonid and the 'verge of being critical threaten', that's the main problem in Paphiopedilum. The scientist have to rely on the professionnal collectors to get informations about the locations. The businessmen are clever, and they bring them to specific localities with a couple of plants, enough to make the scientist happy, and to have a 'critical treathened' on a book or a paper. It helps to raise the price. 

In Hanoi, the collector that was all the time in contact with Leonid has copies of some parts of his papers and books, with the 'near extinct', 'critically endangered' and others. Whenever someone comes to his nursery, he has big boxes of all of those 'extinct' species, show a copy of the paper, and push the customer to buy much much, because 'maybe it is the last time, you see the scientist know it is extinct, but I can supply boxes'. That's it...

Frankly, I think two things:
- Paphs are very far from being extinct. In fact, most species are quite common in the right places. All the Chinese/Vietnamese species are available by many, many boxes, except now coccineum
- The pot-plant trade, their main market, will make them extinct quite soon. The supplies cannot last that much.
- They are much faster growing in the wild than in cultivation, for many species. I have seen hangianum first bloom from the wild, they had 2x5 cm leaves, 1-2 12-15 cm leaves, and 1-2 20-25 cm leaves, pristine condition. Not many 'mature roots', quite a few like we find in the flasked seedlings. My guess is that those plants were not more than 2 years old. Maybe the fungus or bacterias around the roots supply something to the orchids that we are lacking in culture, normally. Maybe an amino acid, maybe something else. 

Anyway, those plants had no lichen on the leaves, and in the wild most old plants of hangianum have plenty of lichen on the leaves, impossible to remove.

There were many stories of 'jungle vigor', where plants freshly collected grow like crazy, and progressively slow down. I think it might be related. 

Really borderline extinct is coccineum. gratrixianum var. daoense is out of reach now.

Plants with some colonies but not too much available because of high price is vietnamense ( price raised after many people mentionned it is 'extinct').

All the remaining is available anywhere, anytime here. Even delenatii are still sold by the kilo in Da Lat, fresh collected plants.


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## practicallyostensible (Mar 3, 2008)

I don't know what to think other than if all this hangianum, jackii, CITES nonsense continues (and I really don't seen an end in sight) it's going to get really messy in the next few years. Plants are going to be crossed, imported and sold under the names of legal crosses, and lines are going to get mixed. I don't know if there is any way around that.


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## Roy (Mar 3, 2008)

practicallyostensible said:


> I don't know what to think other than if all this hangianum, jackii, CITES nonsense continues (and I really don't seen an end in sight) it's going to get really messy in the next few years. Plants are going to be crossed, imported and sold under the names of legal crosses, and lines are going to get mixed. I don't know if there is any way around that.



A few years ago, Dr Guido Braem was rubbished no end for some of his papers regarding the complete mess the Paphs and Phrag species names were in and that the RHS register on names and parentages was a waste of time in referring to, to research crossings as many, most of the primary and hybrids from them were incorrect. Sanderianum so far has completely confirmed Guido's findings. I am not siding with Guido as being perfect in his findings but pure visual experience and practical experience over many years have seen what has been explained so far. As far as I can see, we are all guilty of accepting what we are sold as being true to label yet when I go back and read up the original descriptions of these orchids in Sanders 1927 Edition, Veitch & Sons etc, there is a fair degree of difference in what is written to what you see now. Admittedly, quality clones thru outcrossing can improve flower quality, the general characteristics of a plant and flower remain. These features somehow are missing in those clones now.


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## NYEric (Mar 5, 2008)

Unfortunately, there aren't lots of fotos of old originally described species.


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## heliomum (Mar 5, 2008)

I don't if I could wait that long, but I guess it pays off.oke:


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## smartie2000 (Mar 5, 2008)

NYEric said:


> Unfortunately, there aren't lots of fotos of old originally described species.



There still are herbarium sheets though. I wonder how well they would look now.


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