Laelia Trios

Laelia purpurata var. werkhauseri

Long days are the best thing about summer, as far as I'm concerned. (Sunrise at 6 am, at last! Daylight until 9 pm!) Long days and Laelia purpurata.

Laelia purpurata var. carnea

Laelia purpurata varieties (and there are lots) are outstanding in every way: easy to grow; magnificent on display. In a contest between Laelia and Cattleya, Laelia gets my vote, every time.

Laelia purpurata adores heat and very bright light. So if you're living in the Pacific Northwest, or in a cavern-like dwelling, maybe they're not the plant for you. But if you excel at cattleyas, whether in a greenhouse or indoors, and can find a slightly warmer, brighter microclimate in your growing area, you really need to be growing laelias. They are that awesome.

Our favorite Laelia sources include Tropical Orchid Farm (HI), Carter & Holmes (SC), and Andy's Orchids (Andy, located in Encinitas, California, excels in Laelia species from the cooler, drier Mexican highlands).

& the Laelias Keep Coming

Laelia tenebrosa

Laelia purpurata label missing

Laelia purpurata carnea

Yes, there are orchids in flower this week besides the laelias, but photographing them has become a compulsion. They're handsome plants and so photogenic.

I love the evocative Latin names given to some of the laelia species--tenebrosa comes from the same root as tenebrae, a word I associate with Good Friday and which means 'darkness'. Carnea is 'flesh-red'. We grow our Laelia tenebrosa orchids under the same conditions as our laelia purpuratas--very warm and very bright.

My heart sinks when I notice a label missing from one of our plants. A missing label is a big headache for us for a variety of reasons, and not just because there are hundreds of Laelia purpurata varieties to sift through. Even if we succeed in identifying our plant's name, all of the other data that we have collected on that particular plant (source, acquisition date, etc.) has become forever disassociated. We usually attach our collection labels to the pot in which the orchid is planted, but sometimes labels break, or are removed. *Sigh* If you can identify our Laelia purpurata 'label missing', drop me a line.

The Brazilian Beauty, Laelia purpurata

Laelia purpurata carnea

June is a terrific month to see some of the showiest orchids in our collection. The Laelia purpurata* varieties, Stanhopea species and Anguloa (Tulip Orchid) species make a wonderful early summer combo. However, it is the Laelia purpurata varieties who are the undisputed stars of early summer. They pretty much own the Orchid Center for from late May until July.

Laelia purpurata 'Adam's' x "alba"

Laelia purpurata is enormously popular with orchid growers in warm countries, especially in Brazil, in the states of Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Sao Paulo, where it grows in coastal areas. Laelia purpurata is the state flower of Santa Catarina.

Laelia purpurata werkhauseri

Among Brazil's many annual floral shows the Joinville Flowers Festival in the state of Santa Catarina is the largest featuring Laelia purpurata. The festival, which hosts varied floral exhibits, scientific lectures, orchid judging, music and dancing, is dominated by the presence of Laelia purpurata and its many varieties. In recent years the festival's visitation has reached nearly 200,000.

In Atlanta Laelia purpurata is easy to grow in a warm (65º night minimum) bright greenhouse.They love Atlanta's long warm summers.We grow our plants in clay pots in a standard Cattleya mix of medium grade fir bark, charcoal and sponge rock. They grow quickly and make handsome specimen plants. Stop by and see them!

*some recent synonyms:
Cattleya purpurata Van den Berg (2008)
Sophronitis purpurata Van den Berg & Chase (2000)

Why An Early Spring Means Trouble

Laelia purpurata 'Adam's' x "alba"  flowering this week in the FOC*

We had an exceptionally mild winter this year followed by a very early spring. Atlanta's dogwoods flowered a month before the Dogwood Festival.

Greenhouse plants are not exempt from the effects of an early spring. I was only slightly surprised and a little dismayed this week to see the first flush of flowers on our bench of Laelia purpurata orchids. They typically flower for us in late May and June.

Why dismayed? In a normal year Atlanta's plants have to endure almost four months of daily daytime temperatures above 90º. Ninety degrees outside translates into 85º in the greenhouse when the humidity is high.  Laelia purpurata certainly doesn't mind the heat, but our soft-leaved intermediate growing orchids begin to show signs of heat stress after four months. Since the daytime temperatures are already above 90º, they have a long slog ahead. A few years of this and some of these orchids will simply disappear from our collection.

Just as worrying is the effect of the mild winter and prolonged summer on pest populations. Aphids and some thrip species originate outdoors, so a population boom outdoors spells trouble indoors or in a greenhouse where there are no natural predators.

Resident populations of scale and mealybugs can also explode. As temperatures rise the generation time (the length of time an insect needs to become reproductive) shortens. A long hot summer means many more generations of pests at work on a population of plants already weakened by heat stress.

Stanhopea tigrina flowering on May 1

Moreover, hot conditions limit our use of our favorite low toxicity pesticide, Neem oil, which can harm a plant that is heat and drought stressed. I would hate to have to resort to conventional pesticides because of the heat. This year we started our spray cycle with Neem oil a month early.

One weapon that I have at my disposal is the ability to manipulate the greenhouse environment. By programming the exhaust fans and evaporative cooler to run not just during the day, but also during the coolest part of the night (3 am to 6 am) I can drive down the night temperature to a reasonable level.

Even so, we're in for a long battle.

*Synonyms:
Sophronitis purpurata Van den Berg & Chase (2000)
Cattleya purpurata Van den Berg (2008)