Hi guys,
a few comments and photos of my continuing experiment that is growing cyps in pots in the UK using predominantly inorganic ( perlite) compost.
Last year in the UK we had a wet and rainy summer with little heat stress.
The winter that followed was colder than we have experienced recently and most of the cyps woke up a little later than normal.
Growth of the various species and hybrids is more 'compressed together' than last year.
The plants seem to have enjoyed last summer - there has been a gratifying increase in size of many of them.
The first photo shows the plants growing on the north side of the greenhouse.
They receive a bit of late afternoon sun only.
The second and third photos show something that I've not seen in previous seasons - two flowers on a single stem.
Michael has four stems and three have double flowers.
Last year I made a real effort to keep the plants wet during the growing season to try to avoid any water stress- they were stood in a little bit of rain water for most of the year.
I also tried to remember to fertilize more frequently, especially the hybrids.
One or two of these have tripled in size - Pixi and a x ventricosum.
I repotted most of them in the autumn and found that there were no problems with this new regime apart from one plant.
This was the ultra vigorous hybrid 'Sunnny' that had filled the pot with roots and in consequence a few had rotted at their tips.
The plants is fine now and has thirteen flowers from twelve stems.
One thing that becomes more apparent as time passes is the increase in size of individual stems.
The Inge in photo 2 is now flowering with stems at least 50% taller than when it first started to flower. The flowers are also bigger.
The stems are thicker and the leaf area is much greater.
Inge is the first hybrid to flower every year and I really like the thick red line round the edge of the lip.
The last photo illustrates a problem that has already been highlighted on the forum.
This plant was bought over winter as Cyp. yunnanense. It appears to be a small tibeticum.
This spring I'm making a real effort to fertilize just as the plants start to grow in the spring.
It would seem likely that their greatest requirement for nitrogen would be when they are making leaf in the early spring.
I'd previously been told not to bother with fertilizer until after the flowers wither.
So far no problems.
I'll post more photos as more of them flower,
Regards,
David

David, fantastic job growing your plants - they look awesome! I'm sure they loved the cool summer just as much as the cold winter. I envy your conditions, well, for the Cyps anyway. As for my aging body, I prefer warmer temperatures. That is a nice little tibeticum, BTW, despite the misnaming.

Thanks for sharing these with us, and please post more as they flower.

Beautiful plants! Good job!

Beautiful! I agree the last one is a tibeticum.

very very pretty:heart::Party::heart:

Wow...awesome plants!:cool:

Hi guys,

thanks for the comments. Tom - we still had higher than normal overall summer mean temperatures - its just we had quite a bit of rain as well and that took the edge off the peaks we occasionally get. I think it went over 30 degrees once all summer.
I live in East Anglia where we normally receive around a week of these higher temperatures.
Anyway here is a topic especially for you.
After much searching I managed to get hold of a nice plant of this distinct variety of macranthos with the mouthful of a name of hotei atsumorianum.
It is found in Japan and very distinct from the normal species.
If you compare the photos below, 'hotei' is much more robust with thicker ,wider leaves and a very 'chunky' appearance. It also appears to be much less hairy on the leaves and stems.
It looks like a 'converted tetraploid' of a macranthos.
The flower develops differently. Even when it was very small and only just visible in the centre of the plant, the dark colour was well developed. The normal variety has a well developed bud that is already free from the leaves before it starts to colour.
There are certainly many more obvious differences between the two plants than you can see between some of the other species within the macranthos/tibeticum complex.
We'll have to wait for a day or two for the final flower photos but you can see the obvious potential with hotei and why it is so desirable.
The final photo shows a plant of fasciolatum. There are now plenty of seed grown plants of this available in Europe. It seems to be pretty easy to grow and is certainly an excellent parent for hybrids. Almost all of them are quick robust growers.
This one has an almost white lip. My other clone has a distinctly more yellow lip,
Regards,
David

very very nice pretty:heart::heart::heart:

Very beautiful flowers and nice pictures.

They are all so beautiful! Thank you for sharing them with us!

Wow very nice plants and nice pix!!!

Beautiful plants! You're doing a great job!

Cool, you got a hold of a hoteiastumorisou! These are expensive plants here, ranging between ¥250,000 to ???? (over $250 US and up to the thousands) per single eyed plant depending on the quality and size of the flower. Much larger overall than normal C. macranthos for sure, almost like a C. tibeticum. I know that Michael Weinert offered some this past fall (a form called 'Kamanashi' after the area it's from) - is that where you got it? Outside of Japan true hoteis are rare indeed. Don't lose that one!

Keep the pics coming!

Wow...lovely plants and blooms:cool:

Morning,

as the UK seems to be basking in week of unseasonable warmth of 70 degrees and the cyps are growing fast, I thought I'd use an appropriate title!
Tom - thanks for the information, but I didn't pay anything like the amounts you are suggesting for the hotei.
It cost no more than a regular macranthos.
It came from a well known UK grower and breeder-hobbyist who I've dealt with for a few years.
I did hear about the variety of hotei you mention and tried to find a plant but they had all been sold.
I'd love to grow a few more varieties of this form.
The first photo shows the differences more clearly between this variety and the normal species. They look very different.
As the collection of plants develops and they get larger and stronger I'm tempted to cross a few. I have a very nice large flowered tibeticum that I could cross hotei with, but the problem in the UK is that I know of no companies that offer flasking services like Ron Burch in the USA.
The following photo is of the ultra vigorous hybrid 'Sunny'. Thirteen flowers this year from a start of one four years ago.
This vigour seems to be mainly due to the use of fasciolatum as a parent.
It is twice the size of any other plant in the collection.
At this rate of increase it will be the first plant that will need splitting this coming autumn.
Michael Wienert recommends doing this when there are around 15 growths,
Regards,
David

Beautiful plants.

very very nice pretty:heart::heart::heart:

Wow nice plants and blooms!!!

They are so beautiful thank you for sharing them with us!

Hi David,

all your plants look wonderful but this hotei atsumorianum is absolutely stunning!

Congratulations!

Great looking plants! Well done!

Beautiful colors! I really like the dark tone of the hotei!

Wonderful colors! Beautiful plants!

Thanks for sharing!

Fantastic blooms...:cool:

Hi guys,
something that I didn't appreciate when I first started out growing cyps was the huge disparity between species in both plants and flower size.
It is something that isn't apparent when individual plants are photographed separately.
On the back row are the hybrids Sunny and Inge.
In the front are parviflorum var. parviflorum and macranthos var hotei atsumorianum.
You can see just how small the flowers are of parviflorum.
There is also a fair amount of hybrid vigour apparent in some crosses.
Both the hybrids on the back row are fasciolatum crosses.
This species is large flowered but quite usually short - around the height of parviflorum and hotei.
But - cross it with parviflorum and you get Inge.
Talk about hybrid vigour!
Inge must be twice the height of either parent.
Sunny is fasciolatum x calceolus, which is far more like the height you'd expect from the parents.
It seems to make up for a lack of height with excellent vigour,
Regards,
David

very very nice pretty:heart::heart::heart:ty

Wow nice plants!!!

Great looking plants in flower!

Thanks for sharing!

Beautiful! That is a very tall cyp!

Fabulous plants and blooms...:cool:

Hi Guys,
this is the photo that I should have posted yesterday.
At the back - the hybrid 'Inge' and in front, the parents, parviflorum var parviflorum
and a couple of different clones of fasciolatum.
Even if the parental clones used to make this plant were much bigger than these, it is still a hell of a jump to the hybrid!
The hybrid Victoria is the next photo.
The parents are parviflorum var pubescens and fasciolatum. Quite a nice balanced flower, very similar to Sunny.
This is a seedling flowering for the first time with three shoots and two flowers.
Plant height is only a couple of inches taller than fasciolatum but I'm expecting it to get much bigger as it matures.
If 'Inge' is anything to go by, it should eventually approach it in size as they are so closely related.
Inge isn't the tallest hybrid I have - that goes to the macranthos x kentuckiense hybrid 'Philipp' but this is at least a couple of weeks off flowering yet.
I'm waiting to post a photo of 'hotei' but this plant is way way slower to mature a flower than all the others that I have,
Regards,
David

Beautiful well grown plants!

Cyp city is looking good!
I also like how you potted up your veggies! I have never seen that done before. I may have to try it myself!

Morning,
a couple more that have finally opened.
First is the nice form of macranthos - hotei atsumorianum.
The flower doesn't seem to want to open fully - this may be as far as it goes.
It is a first year division so it may well improve in form next year.
The colour is a deep wine red and very nice. The photo shows the flower slightly paler than it actually is.
The second photo is a second generation hybrid - Hideki Okuyama is ventricosum x fasciolatum.
Werner Frosch's web site has a photo of a plant of this cross with a nice macranthos-red colour. Not so this one. I would have preferred one with more colour. I guess that this cross was made with a very pale or white ventricosum in the hope of producing a large white flower.
When this plant flowered for the first time last year it was so bad that I didn't even take a photo. It has improved quite a bit but it is still a very average flower.
You cannot win them all!
The last photo is a group shot - the weather was so warm last week that the plants really moved quickly.
Extreme left is parviflorum var pubescens and the red one in the middle is Michael.
The pots with buds just showing are reginae and a couple of it's hybrids.
Regards,
David

Beautiful cyp plants!

Thanks for sharing!

very very pretty:heart::heart::heart:ty

They are gorgeous plants and I love the color of the flower in the first picture. Thank you for sharing them with us!

Thanks for the continuing tour David. Many hoteis don't quite open fully, but since it is a new division it may have a better flower next season. I had no idea that Inge was that large a flower. Very cool!

Very nice plants.

Wow nice blooms and plants!!!

Hi Guys,
a few more photos of hybrids.
Tom - Inge was nowhere near that size when the plant first started to flower. Over the years it gradually grew in size and so did the flowers. When I first flower a reginae it is often about a foot to fifteen inches high. But look at what Paul can produce with his mega reginae - three times the size.
I think it is very easy to starve plants in pots, especially when they are being grown in such free draining compost. You probably almost need to feed at every watering, especially when they are in full growth early in the season.
This problem is made worse by the fact that the species can only take small amounts of feed. It is a difficult balancing act.
Nick - I've grown tomatoes in grow bags for many years. It works well but you do need to water them every day in the summer.
First up is the hybrid 'Michael'( macranthos x henryi). It isn't the brightest red and when it first started to flower I wasn't at all enamoured with it. The colour was pretty muddy.But again, over the years it has gradually improved in size and colour and now it is in the 'OK category. It helps that there are now double flowers on three of the four stems.
Hank Small( parviflorum x henryi) is a strange one. This plant refuses to increase in the number of stems. It must have flowered for at least three years but there is still only one. The stem gets taller and the number of flowers increases, but that is all. Does anyone else have this problem?
Lastly we have another mis-labelled plant. I've grown it for about three years and this is the first flower. It was bought as macranthos but to me looks like a ventricosum.
It is quite nice and increase well so it is a keeper,
Regards,
David

hey David ,
tks for interresting new pics.

maybe the "last pic" on that page from Werner Frosch
helps to identify, whether it is macranthos or ventricosum.

http://www.w-frosch.de/Cypris/Hybriden/ventr.htm

my bet is X ventricosum............

cheers
dieter

hey,
this is just "the other case":

I bought two of these from a buddy last winter.
as I understood, they were fresh imported from Korea,
and should be X ventricosum albiflora.

I am really happy to have them :woohoo:

http://www.bildercache.de/bild/20090428-121601-23.jpg

no doubt, both are macranthos alba......................
http://www.bildercache.de/bild/20090428-124412-765.jpg

cheers
dieter

Gorgeous plants and flowers! Thank you for sharing them with us!

Beautiful flowers!

very very pretty:heart::heart::heart:

Those cyps look great!

Oh, That is also a beautiful macranthos alba!

Very nice cyp flowers.

Lovely blooms...nice pics!

Beautiful!

hi there,
just a few of the more common plants today.
The calceolus is a bit of an enigma.
I've had the plant at least four years and it only grows very slowly. It has four flowers this year and is still only about six inches high. About the same size as the parviflorum and with the same size flowers.
Does anyone know whether this is within the range of the species or have I yet another mis-labelled plant?
The parviflorum at least looks correctly named and is doing OK.
Sabine is yet another fasciolatum cross, this time with macranthos.
This particular plant is young and flowering for the first time with two flowers and only about six inches high. I have another plant of the same cross doing exactly the same thing.
I'm hoping that as the plant matures, the stems and flowers will get bigger and I won't have to bend double to get a photo of it.
The final photo shows a very plump and promising bud from a large flowered tibeticum that is about to open.
Last year was it's first with me and the flower was excellent. This year the plant has doubled and it has two stems and buds. Both the growths and buds look to be bigger than last year.
It will be very tempting to pollinate one of these flowers with the hotei that is currently out,

Regards,

David

The calceolus is a bit of an enigma.
I've had the plant at least four years and it only grows very slowly. It has four flowers this year and is still only about six inches high. About the same size as the parviflorum and with the same size flowers.
Does anyone know whether this is within the range of the species or have I yet another mis-labelled plant?


That definitely is a true calceolus. What medium are you growing it in? It is a true lime-lover just like candidum. Perhaps it is just a little dwarfed from conditions less to its liking...then again, it looks perfectly healthy to me. Sabine will get bigger, but given its fasciolatum parentage, it will remain shorter than most large flowered Cyps. If that hotei were mine, I would self it. They are not common plants and so should be propagated. Or, I'd cross it with that lovely tibeticum that's about to open to create a large, dark flowered hybrid. Just my two cents...

Thanks again for all the shots. Your plants look great!

Beautiful plants and flowers!

Thanks for sharing!

Wow you have some nice cyps!!!

Very nice flowers and plants.

very very pretty:heart::heart::heart:

They are all so beautiful as usual!

Beautiful!

Very nice tibeticum! Beautiful!

Fantastic blooms...:cool:

Hi guys,

Tom- thanks for the helpful comments - I will try to add some lime to the compost this year andsee it it helps. The garden is on chalk so there is no shortage of it.
I haven't seen any deficiency symptoms in the growths to suggest that there is a problem, apart from the overall size.
I will certainly self the hotei but not perhaps this year. It is a first year division and I don't want to stress it too much and give it an excuse to keel over.
The cross of hotei with tibeticum has already been made by Svante Malmgren and he reports that the resulting seedlings are vigorous, so maybe that is the way forward this year.
It should certainly yield some large flowered dark red plants and if they also had some hybrid vigour and clumped up well then they would be stunning.
My other option is a cross with the ultra vigorous 'Sunny" but the success rate of these sorts of second generation crosses seems to be low.
The other problem is that fasciolatum seems to bleach out the red of macranthos so there is no guarantee that the flowers would be dark.
I have a lovely tall 'Philipp' and this seems a better bet for a dark flowered second generation hybrid. The only problem here is that the plant is only about six inches high and will be at least two weeks before the flowers open. Can you save cyp pollen easily?

Regards,
David

David,

Cyp pollen stores well in a sealed bag in the fridge for quite a while, so no problem. The cross with Philipp would be a good choice indeed. Normally I think fasciolatum makes great hybrids, but in general I don't like crossing yellow flowers with purple - too many end up being dogs in my opinion. I'd still cross it with the tibeticum if it were mine.

Hi Guys,

Tom - thanks for the information on pollen storage.

A couple more have opened and I'd like your thoughts on one of them - it may be mis-named.

First up is Aki ( macranthos x pubescens) and a nice clone. The combination of yellow and purple works with this one although the lip pales fairly quickly and becomes almost white.

Second is Pluto ( fasciolatum x franchetii). It looks nothing like the photo on Werner Frosch's web site. The flower hasn't the typical bulbous lip of fasciolatum crosses and also seems small for the size of flower. The petals are an odd rusty red.Anyone care to take a guess as to the real parents?

Lastly we have the large flowered tibeticum - it certainly is a pretty thing and this particular flower has just been pollinated with the pollen from hotei,

Regards,

David

so pretty:heart::heart::heart:

I like the last one which looks great.

Wow very nice blooms!!!

Beautiful Cyp tibeticum!

David, I'd say the hybrid does have C. fasciolatum in it give the toothed margin of the lip oriface and the distinct purple veination of the lip. Maybe it is more in line with C. Victoria (parviflorum v. pubescens x fasciolatum).

That is a nice C. tibeticum and I think it a wise choice to hybridize it with the hotei. No doubt you'll end up with lovely flowered plants plus maybe some hybrid vigor to boot!

That is a very nice set of blooms!

Tom,

thanks for the comments on Pluto.
I've saved the spare pollinia from the hotei in the fridge for crossing with Philipp.
Do you know what sort of success rate you get when crossing cyps?
Can you rely on each cross you make to set seed or is it a low percentage?
I could split the pollinia and cross more than a single flower of Philipp.
It will probably have at least seven flowers this year.
Interestingly, when I compared the flowers of hotei with tibeticum, hotei had a much deeper colour in the veins - it was a deep wine red, almost black.
Only the fact that the interveinal regions were pale stopped the flower being much more deeply coloured.

Regards,
David

They are gorgeous! Thank you!

Hi guys,

Peak flowering is happening about now.
First up is a group shot of 'red' hybrids.
Back row, left to right is x ventricosum, 'Michael' and 'Gisela'.
Front row is tibeticum and 'Sabine'.
I like these sort of shots as they give an idea of relative size.
Tibeticum is comfortably the biggest flower and if you could get that onto a larger, taller stem then it would be a real knockout.
Next up is the hybrid Gabriela( fasciolatum x kentuckiense) flowering for the first time and hopefully going to grow much bigger. With the 'big two' of the yellow speciesas parents, I'm hopeful.
Next is a deeply coloured Gisela that refuses to increase much. It is perfectly healthy but it had four stems last year as well.
Lastly we have a very nice division of ventricosum flowering for me for the first time. Four large deeply coloured flowers. Enjoy!
Regards,
David

very nice very pretty:heart::heart::heart:ty

Very nice flowers and plants.

Wow very nice blooms!!!

Beautiful!

Really splendid, congrats!

Amazing Cyps!!

Awesome...thnx

All are fantastic (I love that deep red ventricosum!!!!), but Sabine steals the show in my book. Thanks for all the photos.

Hi Guys,

a few more today that are mostly much smaller than the rest.
First up is the natural hybrid x andrewsii. A bit of a slower grower and tends to be have floppy stems as well.
A small and sweet flower with those beautifully twisted speals.
Next is 'Emil'. A similar sized plant but one that grows much faster and this year has several stems with two flowers.
The group photo shows two different clones of Emil and the x andrewsii.
Lastly we have 'Lucy Pinkepank'. The first of the 'red' kentuckiense hybrids to flower.
A nice big flower on a decent length stem. It is very simiar to 'Philipp'.
However like quite a few tibeticum hybrids, hangs its head under the dorsal sepal. One of these which shows its' flower off like ventricosum would be good,

Regards,

David

very very pretty:heart::heart::heart:

Beautiful flowers and plants.

They are all so beautiful!

Wow very nice blooms!!!

Awesome plants...lovely blooms:cool:

Beautiful plants!

Thanks for sharing!

Hi Guys,

the later flowering red kentuckiense hybrids are now doing their thing.
Usually they're big fat blowsy flowers ( about as OTT as cyps get) with lots of impact.

First and second photo is a plant bought off ebay labelled 'gabriela'.
It is obviously not that but could be either Philipp( macranthos x kentuckiense) or Lucy Pinkepank ( tibeticum x kentuckiense). Anyone any idea?
It is a very big bloom and would have had four flowers on two stems if one bud hadn't been deformed.
I cannot tell the difference between the two hybrids when in flower - see my previous post for a photo of Lucy.

The third photo is a Philipp from a cross using the 'Lake Baikal' form of macranthos reputed to be very 'red'. The flower is slightly deformed as it had an attack of greenfly during development but shows promise - the lip is certainly a deeper colour than other Philipps, as are the lateral petals.
As it is the plants first flower, I'm hoping for futher improvement.
The fourth photo shows a comparison of the 'not Gabriela' and the dark Philipp.

Lastly we have the hybrid 'Pixi' - a vigorous short growing hybrid with dark chocolate and red flowers - different and quite striking. A good grower, it has more than doubled the number of stems this year ( three to seven) and produced stems with double flowers.The parents are calceolus and tibeticum,

Regards,

David

very nice blooms!! I like the last one the best!!!

Beautiful Cyps!!

very very pretty:heart::heart::heart:ty

Very nice flowers.

Again, beautiful!!

They are all very beautiful!