# australian terrestrials



## cnycharles (Mar 14, 2011)

I think this is the first time I've posted in this thread (at least any time recently). I just finished potting a bunch of tiny tubers that came from Nesbitt's Orchids in Australia. I had first contacted Les a number of years ago about acquiring caladenias, but I had decided that I didn't have the skills or patience to try them. .. was good idea, since many of the caladenias need mychorrizae to grow, and most won't grow outside of their normal habitat (or a pot inoculated with the local fungus) so they don't sell them outside australia. There are a few caladenias that don't really need the fungus so they were available on the export list

It's quite a list, but they're tiny so they don't take up much space!  (imagine a tuber smaller than the end of your pinky)

caladenia flava x latifolia
caladenia latifolia
corybas diemenicus
corybas incurvis
cyrtostylis robusta
diplodium robustum
diplodium truncatum
diuris orientis 'SA'
diuris sulphurea
leptoceras menziesii
pterostylis curta
pterostylis Hoodwink
pterostylis x ingens
pterostylis nutans
pterostylis pedunculata
pterostylis Talhood
thelymitra aff. frenchii
thelymitra Goldfingers
thelymitra Melon Glow
thelymitra nuda 'Marble Hill'

no pictures yet, but will post some soon along with sprouts! (some tubers were already sprouting in the box)

this link http://members.cox.net/lmlauman/osp/html/pterostylis_curta.html shows a general media for potting australian terrestrials. Les pointed out that diuris could use a slightly more clay-ey media, but that to be safe something slightly more sandy would work as well. I used so-called 'desert sand', cactus potting media, some tiny perlite, a small amount of blood and bone meal. tomorrow I'll steal some branches from a scotch pine tree and chop the needles to cover the tops of the pots. it was recommended that most wouldn't need any fertilizer, though the cactus potting soil has a tiny amount of fertilizer in it (along with the blood and bone meal). he also says that diuris and pterostylis can take a small amount of foliar fertilizer when they are small, but that most of the others are used to a nutrient-poor soil


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## JeanLux (Mar 14, 2011)

Wow Charles, that is an impressive list of australian locals :drool: !!!! I wish you a very good hand with them :clap: !!! Jean


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## Bolero (Mar 14, 2011)

That is an impressive list, some of those are hard to come by here.


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## Brian Monk (Mar 14, 2011)

WOW! I can't wait to see the photos. Good luck, I have always wanted to grow these plants (esp. Thelymitra!)


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## NYEric (Mar 14, 2011)

My previous purchase of pterostylis curta from Asuka Orchids are sprouting in a bark mix. The ones in soil i over-watered, no surprise there!  Thanx for putting together this order Charles, I'm awaiting the tubers anxiously.


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## paphioboy (Mar 14, 2011)

Whoa... that is some haul.. Yes, most are tiny, but to have 1 tuber looking pretty 'miserable' in a pot of its own just does not do justice to the plant. Les often plants about 10 or more tubers per pot..


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## cnycharles (Mar 15, 2011)

thanks.. yes, I had a hard time deciding what to get and how many... my 'budget' wouldn't allow me to get a handful of each one I wanted to try, and since I likely wouldn't be ordering from australia again soon, had to go with one of each of a few, and a few others with two or three. I hope I keep them all alive so I can see a full pot someday!

hope your plants arrived yesterday or today eric, it was fun playing with other people's money!


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## NYEric (Mar 15, 2011)

That's what my old stock broker said! 
I'm mixing potting soil w/ sandy topsoil from work for some. should be interesting.


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## Howzat (Mar 16, 2011)

Australian terrestrial orchids lovers
There is no better place to go and see these terrestrial orchids than Perth and its surrounding. Mr Andrew Brown will be the speaker of native western australia terestrial orchids at the next AOC conf in Sept 2012. For inclusion in the committee's EMailing address write to : [email protected] or their website  www.waorchids.iinet.net.au/19th_AOC_Conference.htm.
Apart from Mr Brown, Terry Root (Paph), Xavier Garreau (Paph), Roy Tokunaga, Johann Herman, Robert Fuchs and Mike Coronado,Dr Henry Oakley (UK), Ivan Portilla (Equador), Greg Bryant (Austr. cymbidium), Fred Clarke, (Ca)
The Western Australia government has given a grant of $200,000 towards the staging of this 19th AOC Conf. and the stage is Burswood resort cassino, only 2 km from the CBD across the beautiful Swan River.


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## biothanasis (Mar 16, 2011)

WOW!!! I'd love to get similar genera too, but the expenses are very high...!!!


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## Andrew (Mar 16, 2011)

cnycharles said:


> I had a hard time deciding what to get and how many... my 'budget' wouldn't allow me to get a handful of each one I wanted to try, and since I likely wouldn't be ordering from australia again soon, had to go with one of each of a few, and a few others with two or three.


 
I wouldn't worry too much. If you grow them well the species you bought will multiply very quickly. You'll spend the first year adjusting them to your hemisphere but after that you can probably get a potful of most of them within 2-3 years.


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## NYEric (Mar 16, 2011)

Probably true. I was surprised to see the 2 pterostylis I potted in bark are spreading throughout the pot!


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## cnycharles (Mar 18, 2011)

*aussie order plus a few*

my co-workers would have been amazed to know that this little box they were tossing around was filled with over $1000 worth of orchid tubers! (good thing they were small and well-packed  )











the whole collection potted up (don't mind the fork sticking out of the one round pot; I had to dig out the leptoceras menziesii tubers so that I could bag them with a banana skin)





just imagine some funky corybas filling the top of this pot!  





three leptoceras tubers and banana skin which should induce them to flower. Les Nesbitt told me that the banana skin is supposed to give off ethylene gas, which is supposed to trigger flowering. he also pointed out that he had not seen leptoceras menziesii flower with(out) this trigger

I had the camera out, and was looking for a few things to take snapshots of; I found these two terrestrials (not specifically from australia though maybe one of them) emerging from their pots





my habenaria medusae emerging with a new second growth! (yay) I just noticed the new growth, so just started watering the pot mostly from the bottom. after the flower spike started to wilt last fall, I put the pot with a clear plastic dome over the top back into the warmer growing area but kept it water-free. this is the first time in many months it has had any water at all





my stenoglottis longifolia which hails from south africa, purchased from rice's orchids, also with a few new shoots


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## Kevin (Mar 18, 2011)

Howzat said:


> Australian terrestrial orchids lovers
> There is no better place to go and see these terrestrial orchids than Perth and its surrounding. Mr Andrew Brown will be the speaker of native western australia terestrial orchids at the next AOC conf in Sept 2012. For inclusion in the committee's EMailing address write to : [email protected] or their website  www.waorchids.iinet.net.au/19th_AOC_Conference.htm.
> Apart from Mr Brown, Terry Root (Paph), Xavier Garreau (Paph), Roy Tokunaga, Johann Herman, Robert Fuchs and Mike Coronado,Dr Henry Oakley (UK), Ivan Portilla (Equador), Greg Bryant (Austr. cymbidium), Fred Clarke, (Ca)
> The Western Australia government has given a grant of $200,000 towards the staging of this 19th AOC Conf. and the stage is Burswood resort cassino, only 2 km from the CBD across the beautiful Swan River.



Thanks for that info! Would love to go!


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## Kevin (Mar 19, 2011)

Very cool, Charles!


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## chrismende (Mar 19, 2011)

That will be fun to watch with you!


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## NYEric (Mar 19, 2011)

Did we order plants together then too? I have the same plants I think!


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## likespaphs (Mar 19, 2011)

cnycharles said:


> ...banana skin is supposed to give off ethylene gas, which is supposed to trigger flowering....




don't forget to keep fresh fruit away from flowers as the ethylene as causes flowers to fade _*very*_ fast


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## cnycharles (Mar 19, 2011)

NYEric said:


> Did we order plants together then too? I have the same plants I think!



well I ordered one of about half or more of the plants, so I'm sure we had most of the same plants on the list (though I think you were the only one who ordered the pterygodium catholica, though I was thinking about it)


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## paphioboy (Mar 19, 2011)

Nice haul...  Stenoglottis grows like a weed over here... I think the growers here use a bark-based mix for it.. Same as paphs..


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## NYEric (Mar 20, 2011)

cnycharles said:


> well I ordered one of about half or more of the plants, so I'm sure we had most of the same plants on the list (though I think you were the only one who ordered the pterygodium catholica, though I was thinking about it)


No I meant the habenaria and the stenoglottis. 


paphioboy said:


> Nice haul...  Stenoglottis grows like a weed over here... I think the growers here use a bark-based mix for it.. Same as paphs..



Thanx for the info, I did the same.


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## cnycharles (Apr 3, 2011)

*shoots!*

a few pots have shoots coming up;






thelymitra nuda 'marble hill'





thelymitra aff. frenchii (a true Blue orchid)





thelymitra 'melon glow'





in the two joe pots I put the pterostylis (or most of them); one has three different species
and the other has three different hybrids. these two shoots are p. pedunculata and p. nutans


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## Kevin (Apr 3, 2011)

Awesome!! Congrats!:clap:


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## Marc (Apr 3, 2011)

Exciting times ahead, looks like your taking care of them the right way.


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## NYEric (Apr 3, 2011)

Wow, I have to check my thelymitras then. Looking good.


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## biothanasis (Apr 4, 2011)

:clap:.... Good luck!!


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## cnycharles (May 17, 2011)

my australian terrestrials are progressing nicely! all of the pterostylis are up and have nice whorls of leaves, the two diplodiums (pterostylis-like greenhoods) are up; the truncatum has a whorl and no flower and the robustum has a flower bud that is almost open believe it or not! the leptoceras have all emerged and most of the thelymitras have emerged, though I thought the white thely (t. latifolia 'white') was coming up but now I don't see it  . the diuris orientis did the same thing, but now a shoot is progressing; the d. sulphurea has a double-leaf shoot and is growing nicely. just the corybas haven't emerged yet, but from nyeric's reports of watching them grow up through the sides of his clear pots, I'm assuming that they will in a few weeks

I have a small LED 'flood' light which I put over the diuris to get them the most light, as I've read that they can take lots of light. I also have a spotlight reflector with a strong compact fluorescent bulb in it, and I've left them both on day and night for several weeks and the shoots all look strong except for the thelymitra goldfingers 'pinkie', whose shoot top looks sort of burnt. I don't know if that is because of the lights, or because the media has too much fertilizer in it? if anyone has any idea, feel free to let me know





diplodium robustum 'green', you can see the forks of the lip, almost ready to flower; exciting!





two joe pots with the pterostylis. the front one has the hybrids Hoodwink, Talhood and x ingens; the back one has species curta nutans and pedunculata





front left is the diuris orientis 'SA' which finally emerged a few days ago. behind that with the double leaf is diuris sulphurea and the thick, bluish-green shoot is thelymitra nuda 'marble hill'. over to the back right is thelymitra melon glow. if you look closely, you can see smaller shoots at the base of the tall shoots of thelymitra nuda and melon glow, which i'm assuming are new side-shoots or tubers which are growing alongside the original ones





the three shoots coming up are leptoceras menziesii (finally!) we'll see if that banana skin in a bag treatment of the tubers will induce them to flower. if not, then hopefully they'll increase nicely instead





this tubular leaf is hiding a set of flower buds deep inside! this is cyrtostylis robusta which just emerged a few days ago





this fuzzy leaf is thelymitra flava x latifolia; the leaf is cool!





this funky leaf is thelymitra goldfingers 'pinkie'. the leaf at first looked just fine, but then it started to gnarl on top. the base is still growing, but i'm wondering if it is looking poorly because of too much fertilizer, and if so I should probably water it a bunch to try and wash some of it out? maybe it needs a little bit more shade though I figured at this stage they would all appreciate more light (we have had very little light here since I planted these, except for one week about a week ago besides the electric lights)





this isn't australian and probably not a tuber, but being a cool terrestrial orchid I wanted to include it's progress. this is the south african (or african) stenoglottis longifolium





this whorl is diplodium truncatum 'You Yangs Victoria' which I believe denotes the original location of this clone





I forgot to take a pic of this earlier - it's thelymitra aff. frenchii, which means that it looks a lot like t. frenchii, but different enough that it might be a new species. I think often if something has been determined, generally to be a new species that looks like another but hasn't been formally described yet, it receives the 'affine' or 'affinity' designation





this is a shot of my lights and tuber collection except for the corybas out in the kitchen. shows the led light on left and compact fluorescent on the right. there are also some paph seedlings in another pan to the right, but they don't get enough light there





this is the LED flood light which is more of a spot; I think it's a 16 or 18 watt bulb that I bought at lowes. it wasn't cheap, probably around $40, and I had looked at LED panels online and other floods, but this bulb was close at hand and I didn't have to pay shipping. the australian terrestrials like to stay cool, so I wanted to try LED's to try and help keep them cooler. it's pretty bright and I can move it up or down for the really light-loving plant when they get taller. the LED's are supposed to be much cooler and use a lot less electricity; the ones online for plants used red and blue 'bulbs' and can be specialized for growth (blue) or red (flowering) ; the one I got at lowes was just a cool spot not designed for plants, but since the shoots are staying compact then i'm assuming that they are getting a decent amount of light

I don't know if and of the plants that are just leaves now will have a flower spike emerge later, or if what I see is what I will have this year. time will tell!


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## NYEric (May 17, 2011)

If you look carefully in my thread you can see the pine needles I found in NYC and put w/ the Aussies!  :rollhappy


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## cnycharles (May 17, 2011)

I tried to find your pics in your misc. orchids thread but didn't see them, where are those pics?


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## NYEric (May 17, 2011)

I posted separately in the "Tell me about it".


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## SlipperFan (May 17, 2011)

All kinds of wondrous things coming along!


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## paphioboy (May 17, 2011)

nice progress, Charles. Looks like they might flower in September ( spring over here). IMHO, you can pot pterostylis curta separately from the others because it is a fast grower and produces many underground stolons.


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## cnycharles (May 18, 2011)

thanks. I most likely will do more pots next year, I was pressed for time and pots this winter when everything came in and will keep each different thing in it's own pot. I hope my plants soon look like dave mellard's!


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