I love being wrong

[Bailey Hale]

Okay, maybe I just love learning something I had a missed before. Even after 25 years of growing orchids off and on I love finding out I have more to learn.

For instance, at the recent World Slipper Orchid Conference in Hilo, Mr. Chu Xuan Canh gave a fantastic presentation on Paphiopedilum in the wild in Vietnam, and I had somehow missed that Paph. dianthum occurs in cool high elevations. I had convinced myself that all multiflorals needed it hotter than I can provide outside here in Madeira (land of P. insigne), but I was wrong, and thankfully so! So I've added P. dianthum album to the collection, and even though it's a young seedling and we get nights a bit below 10C/50F it has already opened its first flower. (Actually I'm learning that many species are more tolerant of cool temperatures that I would have imagined based on published information.)

So I'm curious, what "rules" have you discovered aren't as hard and fast as you previously thought?

 

[mrhappyrotter]

Oh, this is nice to know! The climate in my area can be tricky because it gets cold in winter (as low as 5F/-15C), but also gets hot in summer (sometimes as much as 105F/40.5C and likely to go higher in coming decades). So it means orchids that are truly obligate cool growing tropicals can be very challenging, and obligate warm growers can be very expensive to grow due to winter heating.

For the past 2 winters, I've been experimenting with what I'm calling a minimally heated greenhouse. Basically, I'm only heating it enough in the winter to keep the interior temperatures above freezing.

My focus for that greenhouse space is on orchids that I'm confident will handle those low temperatures, such as Cymbidiums, North American natives like Encyclia tampensis and Epidendrum magnoliae and their hybrids, Vanda falcata, and so on.

However, I've also placed other tropical orchids in this space just to see what happens; things I had always read, heard, and assumed would not be happy with temperatures below 50-55F/10C. While I haven't done much testing with tropical slippers in that space, I am finding that Cattleya and Vanda alliance plants seem to be more adaptable to these temps than I expected. Many of the Cattleya alliance plants continue growing just fine all through the winter, which is a big surprise.

On the other hand, my experiment with Phrags was less promising. While most of them survived very cold winter temperatures, they all took very heavy damage once things reached the 35F/1.5C range.

For Paphs, I may consider experimenting more with them this coming winter. So far, I've only placed a few Parvies in the greenhouse over winter, and I was confident they would do fine. I'll add that many years ago, due to outdated literature and advice, I had been lead to believe that Paph emersonii preferred a cool, dry winter rest. So, I subjected my plant to near freezing overnight temperatures for the good portion of the fall & winter one year. Kept dry, of course. And it actually did well under those conditions. It didn't grow, but it also did not show any signs of damage. Only after mentioning this fact here on Slippertalk did I find out it's a warm grower that shouldn't be exposed to near freezing temperatures. I'm just glad my emersonii can't read. But I'll add that I did change my culture based on STers' advice.

 

[Bailey Hale]

Oh, this is nice to know! The climate in my area can be tricky because it gets cold in winter (as low as 5F/-15C), but also gets hot in summer (sometimes as much as 105F/40.5C and likely to go higher in coming decades). So it means orchids that are truly obligate cool growing tropicals can be very challenging, and obligate warm growers can be very expensive to grow due to winter heating.

For the past 2 winters, I've been experimenting with what I'm calling a minimally heated greenhouse. Basically, I'm only heating it enough in the winter to keep the interior temperatures above freezing.

My focus for that greenhouse space is on orchids that I'm confident will handle those low temperatures, such as Cymbidiums, North American natives like Encyclia tampensis and Epidendrum magnoliae and their hybrids, Vanda falcata, and so on.

However, I've also placed other tropical orchids in this space just to see what happens; things I had always read, heard, and assumed would not be happy with temperatures below 50-55F/10C. While I haven't done much testing with tropical slippers in that space, I am finding that Cattleya and Vanda alliance plants seem to be more adaptable to these temps than I expected. Many of the Cattleya alliance plants continue growing just fine all through the winter, which is a big surprise.

On the other hand, my experiment with Phrags was less promising. While most of them survived very cold winter temperatures, they all took very heavy damage once things reached the 35F/1.5C range.

For Paphs, I may consider experimenting more with them this coming winter. So far, I've only placed a few Parvies in the greenhouse over winter, and I was confident they would do fine. I'll add that many years ago, due to outdated literature and advice, I had been lead to believe that Paph emersonii preferred a cool, dry winter rest. So, I subjected my plant to near freezing overnight temperatures for the good portion of the fall & winter one year. Kept dry, of course. And it actually did well under those conditions. It didn't grow, but it also did not show any signs of damage. Only after mentioning this fact here on Slippertalk did I find out it's a warm grower that shouldn't be exposed to near freezing temperatures. I'm just glad my emersonii can't read. But I'll add that I did change my culture based on STers' advice.

I also didn't know this about ermsonii! I got a P. huonglanae (aka emersonii depending on who you ask) last year and it has budded nicely over winter in our cool, but not cold conditions. When I lived in Vermont I had a warm and a cold greenhouse where I also just keep things above freezing, and surprise surprise! I flowered emersonii in there. And Phrags and Catts were all happy too.

I have a few Vandas outside here and they have also flowered easily, even with nights below 10C/50F. I used to fret about keeping them hot after visiting growers in Florida. Maybe if they have enough coerulea "blood" in them they don't mind a bit of a chill.

 

[Tom-DE]

Paph dianthum likes a cool and dry winter and a warmer summer, in the mid 40s(f) in winter(my garage)...Paph emersonii is the same way but winter rest is not necessary based on my experience, and it(emersonii) can handle the cold temperatures down to the low 40f...I am pretty sure most of the Parvi species can handle cooler and drier winter, at least low 50s, or even mid 40s. I don't bring in my parvis till the night temperature goes down to low to mid 40s outside.
Paph. villosum and gratrixianum likes cooler winter as well, easiely low 50s.

I would love to see a summary of the low temperatures of all/most Paph. species if anyone has the information...Thanks.