September 2018 Plant of the evening

Dendrobium Kalon Byrne-Dimos ‘Purple Lip’

It was a very floriferous specimen of dockrillia orchid with numerous attractive flowers covering much of the plant. The fairly large sized flowers had open shape, with grey yellow tepals marked with fine grey purple stripes and prominent white/purple lips. It is a complex hybrid with parentage of Dendrobium fuliginosum, Dendrobium teretifolium, Dendrobium mortii and Dendrobium striolatum. This hybrid has inherited desirable features from its species ancestors, namely the open shape of the flowers and striations of the tepals from Dendrobium striolatum, floriferousness from Dendrobium teretifolium and the appealing lips (purple markings) from Dendrobium mortii.

The plant is grown hanging under 50% shade cloth high on the edge of a rock face in our back garden facing north. During summer, the plant is watered twice a week and more during hot spells. Due to over exposure of sun during last summer, many leaves had a red tinge which had distracted the attractiveness of the colour of the flowers. It might have been a better idea to provide more shading on sunny days to keep the foliage green.

Hitherto, dockrillia orchids have not been as popular even amongst native growers as the dendrobiums. Partly we think this is because they look so different from the more familiar ‘orchids’ both vegetatively and florally. Also, there is not much cultural information available to grow these orchids optimally. However, there has been a recent interest in dockrillia orchids, being seen more often in shows, winning champions and being awarded. One reason is the availability of hybrids with improvements in shape, size, floriferousness and colours. In many cases, these have been the result of the use of PNG species in the hybridization with native species. One notable example has been the use of Dendrobium fuliginosum, e.g. crossed with Dendrobium striolatum to produce Dendrobium Australian Ginger, of which several clones have been awarded.