It might just eat your face.....

It's so ginormous, it might just turn to eating flesh.

Actually, it's just a humongous AV flower of mine.  It's a NoID, but I keep it around for the sheer size of the double flowers.  I have large man-ish hands, keep in mind.

Here it is next to a normal, standard sized flower (Optimara Chico).

It's even almost bigger than the flowers on my cattleya orchid!

Big update!

After a month of pretty much nothing happening, now everything is happening all at once!  The sun finally came out a little bit, and I think stuff is starting to wake up.  Very exciting!

First up is Bc. Hoku Gem 'Freckles', another of my super-reliable catts.  I divided and repotted this one last winter, and I was afraid it would skip a bloom cycle while it adjusted.  Apparently not.  I can see at least 5 buds on the spike, which is a LOT for this one...it prefers to put out 2 or 3 per spike.  It must be happy.

Next, another first-time bloomer for me, Phal. pulcherrima var. champornensis.  The color on this one could be just about anything from white to dark pink, but it should be the peloric form.

Third, I have another first-bloom seedling phal!  This is Phal. mariae.  I got it during springtime 2012 as a growing challenge plant on OrchidGeeks.  A bunch of us got together and ordered some seedlings from (the former) Oak Hill and we've been updating as we get spikes and flowers.  If I'm not mistaken, mine is the first to spike.  Or at least I'm the first to say anything about it.  And of course, the real trick here is going to be finding out whether or not it's a true mariae.  Long story short, it's apparently pretty hard to find a true mariae in cultivation...they're all mostly either bastianii or Lovely Marie (bastianii x mariae).  We'll see what mine looks like in a few months.

And finally....this is neither an orchid nor an African Violet, but I'm super stoked anyway.  There's a bud growing on one of my hoyas!  I didn't think it was ever going to bloom.  This one came tagless, but I'm pretty sure it's just a standard carnosa.

In spike: Phal. equestris (rosea x aurea)

So I was thinking to myself the other day as I was watering my small phals...I wonder how big a Phal. equestris has to be to be "blooming size"?  I have a tiny seedling one that I picked up last year at a local nursery that I really wasn't expecting to be large enough for at least another year or so, given the size of the other equestris I have.

But, apparently the answer is:  this big!

It's so tiny!  I believe that's a 2.5" pot it's quite comfortably living in.  And I'm curious to see what color this one comes out.  Rosea is a light pink/rose color; aurea is white with a yellow lip.  Really really hoping for an orange.  I've wanted an orange equestris for a long time.

Fun with keiki paste!

Keiki paste is something that I've always wanted to mess around with, but only recently did I find some that I could actually afford (read:  it was cheap enough that I could play with it and if it didn't work, I hadn't invested a small fortune).  So about 3 weeks ago, I got my little tub in the mail and set out to mangle a few of my phal spikes.

Here's what happened!

I'm not sure if this will become a subspike of new flowers, or an actual keiki (apparently keiki paste can induce both).  I'm actually leaning towards keiki since subspikes on this particular phal start out a dark purple color, whereas this mystery nubbin is definitely a light green.  Either way, I'm just excited there's SOMETHING going on :)

Enc. cordigera 'Hinomaru' and some squid weirdness

I apologize for the lack of updates.  Not only has there been a whole lot of nuthin going on, but with spring break, then easter break, then massive tests right after I get back to school, I've been kinda busy.

About the only thing to report now is the lone bloom on my new Enc. cordigera 'Hinomaru'.  It smells exactly like an air freshener I used to have...very strange.

And then there's this weirdness.  I noticed the other day that the flower on my squid (Psh. cochleata) was turning yellow, which usually means it's dying off.  The flowers usually last a bit longer than this, so it seemed a little too early.  But then I looked a little closer, particularly at the back of the flower.

The ovary is swollen, and it appears the column of the flower has closed.  All that means that it's likely been pollinated.  But there's nothing here to pollinate it with.  There's only one flower on this plant.  The only other cattleya I have blooming is the above encyclia, and it's pollinia hasn't been removed or disturbed in any way.  So my only guess is that this one self-pollinated.  Strange.  I have absolutely no need for a pod of these, so if the pod matures, I might donate it to Troy Meyer's species propagation lab.