It's pretty rare that I take pictures of an orchid soon after I get it, but for some reason, I did when I picked up a tiny seedling of Vanda luzonica back in 2009. It was a $4 seedling special I picked up from the former Oak Hill Gardens when they visited for a society fall show. Even back then, I "knew" vandas weren't supposed to grow well here. They like lots and lots of humidity and bare roots, neither of which could be provided here. But hey, for 4 bucks, I can buy a baby one and see how long it takes before I kill it, right? I gave it a year, at the most.
Here it is back when i got it. There were actually 3 seedlings in this teeny tiny pot (I gave the other two away a couple years ago and kept the largest one in this pic). I knew it would never get enough humidity in coco fiber, so I got a small net pot and some sphag and repotted it shortly after this:
A year later, it was still alive. And growing. A lot. So I repotted it into a bigger pot.
You guessed it. Here we are, more than 3 years after I first got it, and it's thriving in this no-humidity world. It's still in the same pot as it was 2 years ago (eek), but I've got it in a setup now that I really don't know how to get it out of without destroying the roots it has:
It's in that same net pot, suspended up off the bottom of this plastic food container (hence the skewers). The roots weave in and out of the net pot and wind around the bottom of the plastic container. I water it by filling up the container and letting it sit for an hour every couple days.
I have no idea how big these guys have to be to be considered "blooming size" but I understand it's quite large. I don't know if this is even approaching maturity or not. Maybe I'll get some blooms some day :)
thats nice...beautiful
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