May 2018 Plant of the Evening

Dendrobium Warringah ‘Pink Princess’

The plant had three long cascading flowering spikes each carrying 5-8 flowers. The large widely open flowers had pale pink tepals with nicely contrasting darker pink labella.

Dendrobium Warringah was a primary hybrid between Dendrobium speciosum and Dendrobium bigibbum. It had been around for quite a while, first registered by Wal Upton in 1984.

We found it quite interesting that there appears to be a recent revised interest in this hybrid, appearing more frequently in shows and monthly benching. It could be due to the fact of an award of FCC in 2016 by AOC, to Dendrobium Warringah ‘Purple Heaven’, the only award for this hybrid after more than 30 years. The possibility being that the more recent re-makes of this hybrid, with better quality parents have improved floral quality in terms of size, colour and shape compared to the earlier Dendrobium Warringah. This brings home the rationale for re-making some of the older hybrids using better parents.

As a primary hybrid of two very popular species, it tends to inherit characteristics from both parents. The colour can range from dark pink to pale pink to nearly pure white. One desirable feature of this hybrid is its flowering time, April-July, much earlier than most of the other Dendrobium hybrids. Compared to its parent, Dendrobium bigibbum, this hybrid is easier to grow in the Sydney environment. The longevity of the flowers of this hybrid is another desirable feature inherited from its parent.

Over the years, Dendrobium Warringah has been used as parent for further hybridisation but so far has not produced any outstanding progeny.

Photos by Sau-wan Chan