Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
July 2016
NATIONAL SHOW in NEXT MEETING IN PIETERMARITZBURG will be at September is on track (9-11 the Allan Wilson Shellhole at 7pm on Wednesday 10th August. September), we have a full This is just one month and our last meeting before our house of vendors, from National Show, so please make sure you are there to hear all Ecuador, Taiwan, Thailand, as the latest news and please volunteer to help at the show. well as around the country. So start saving your money now, Our guest speaker for the evening is Dave Brennan who will be there will be SO MANY plants talking about growing orchids organically. Dave has relocated to Hillcrest and is Queensburgh Club’s gain and our loss. We for sale, and there are sure to miss his plants at our meeting s and look forward to hearing all be some you can’t live without!!! his news.
Registration for the two day NEXT MEETING IN HOWICK will be held at Howick Conference which takes place Methodist Church Hall, Main Street at 3pm on Wednesday at the Ascot Conference Centre 10th August. is R1,200 (early bird registration has been extended) and this OPEN DAY will at Dunrobin Nursery, 31 Warwick Rd (off includes 10 excellent orchid Townbush Rd) , Chase Valley on Saturday 13th August from presentations, lunch and teas 9am to 4pm. This will be our last fundraiser before the National on the two days, as well as the Show. So please bring along any plants you have for display, opening Cocktail Party, closing and there will also be plants for sale. More details at next Buffet Dinner, unlimited access weeks meeting. to the Show, and a registration ‘Goody Bag’. ORCHIDS THROUGH HISTORY Orchidelirium is the name given to the Victorian era of Eleven Societies around the flower madness or obsession when collecting and country are involved in building discovering orchids reached extraordinarily high levels. displays at the Show being held Wealthy orchid fanatics or Orchidophiles of the 19th century at the Drill Hall, as well as 3 sent explorers and collectors to commercial displays. Please let almost every part of the world in all your friends, in fact anyone search of new varieties of even if they are not your friends orchids. Orchidelirium is seen as know about the Show. similar to Dutch tulip mania. Today there still exists some levels of orchid madness, that has some times Remember to register on the resulted in theft of exceptional blog to get all the show updates: orchids among collectors, such as Dont be alarmed Madam the Ghost Orchid. Today, https://pmborchidsociety.wordpr — I am an Orchidophile!! Orchidelirium is totally unsustaina- ess.com/saoc-national-orchid- ble. Indeed, many orchid species are endangered, if not show-2016/ nearing outright extinction. Orchidophile is the term given to an orchid lover or enthusiast. Photo above: Laelia anceps var. lineata (Mal Renwick, June Open Day) 1 July 2016
Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
NATIONAL SHOW DETAILS
9-11 September 2016 The SAOC National Orchid Show is held every four years and is hosted by different Societies around South Africa. In September 2016 it is the turn of the Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society to host this prestigious event. The National Show is the biggest display of orchids in the country and many of the Societies from around the country do displays out of all the orchids sent by their members.
National Orchid Show 2016 Speakers and Subject Titles (not necessarily in this order) Friday 1. Jose Portilla – “Ecuadorian Orchids in the 3 main Regions”. 2. Lourens Grobler – Cattleya species, then and now. 3. Peter Greenfield – ‘The myths and mysteries of orchid nutrition’. 4. Nollie Cilliers – Cymbidiums – where we are and an exciting future! 5. Gavin MacDonald – Current trends and recent awards in Paphiopedilum
Saturday 1. Timo van dier Niet – The insatiable intrigue 150 years on: Recent advances in pollination ecology of orchids 2. Tinus Oberholzer – Angraecum stella africa: truly the star of Africa 3. Mike O’Connor – Dendrobiums 4. Heino Papenfos – Smoke-water stimulates Ansellia Africana orchid seed germination 5. Hennie Steyn – Growing Vandaceous Orchids
Vendors There will be a number of vendors selling orchids at the National Orchid Show this year and some are coming from as far as Ecuador and Taiwan. Others are coming from the Western Cape, Mpumalanga and Gauteng. Please visit their websites to view the plants they sell, should you wish to place orders and they can bring them to Pietermaritzburg for you. Ecuagenera – www.ecuagenera.com Ten Shin Gardens – www.tenshinorchids.com Plantae – www.plantae.co.za Afriorchids – www.afriorchids.co.za
ORCHID SHOWS IN AUGUST & SEPTEMBER 1-4 September - GOS Spring Show, Gonubie Hotel, Gonubie 2-4 September - ZOS Spring Show, Boardwalk Inkwazi Shopping Centre, Richards Bay 2-4 September - Rustenburg Orchid Society Spring Show, Waterfall Garden Centre, Rustenburg 3 September - ACOS Day Display, Hibiscus Shopping Mall, Margate 3-4 September - EROS Summer Show, The Garden Shop at Flora Farm, Boksburg 9-11 September - Orchids 2016, National Conference and Show, Drill Hall, Pietermaritzburg – build up etc from Tuesday 17-18 Sep – NOS Spring Show, Parkhill Bowling Club, Umhlanga Rocks Drive, Durban North
2 July 2016
Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
JULY MEETING - PLANT TABLES
PIETERMARITZBURG At our last meeting, owing to a clash of venue, there really wasn’t room for everyone to vote on the plant table although it was nice and cosy, so we just had the usual plant table discussion and Judges choice in each category.
JUDGES CHOICE
Best African Species & Best Best Exotic Species Best Hybrid Overall Rhynchostylis gigantea Cym. Cali Night ’Geyserland’ Mystacidium pusillum Owner: Natalie Blackmore Owner: Natalie Blackmore Owner: Donald Ross
JULY MEETING - TALK At our last meeting Brian Tarr coped admirably with a very small space, and gave us an insight on how he grows his plants on trees, and on mounts in his garden. Thank you Brian for such an interesting talk.
Notes from talk “Mounting Orchids” By Brian Tarr
Brian’s preference is to grow all orchids on trees outside because it is more natural. He doesn’t feed or water his plants and successfully grows and flowers them. He experiments with different bases and tries to make each look interesting and artistic. He brought some lovely mounts along to show the meeting. He has found that the 2 best species of tree for mounting orchids are:
Magnolia which is by far the best for mounting orchids Bottlebrush There is something in the bark of these two trees that seems to stimulate orchid growth. In addition, after cutting a piece of the wood, the bark stays on and doesn’t easily peel off making it better for the orchid to establish.
3 July 2016
Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
JULY MEETING - TALK cont’d
Combretum imberbe - is another good wood for mounting orchids. It comes from the Lowveld and Northern Natal. The wood is heavy and doesn’t rot making it ideal for orchid support. The paperbark or Melaleuca Treefern stump. Brian recommends that you use only the bottom two thirds of the stump which is much harder and doesn’t rot as easily as the top section. Pot plant “moss sticks” work well for Laelia growth Brian has also used old CCA treated slats (more than 4 years old). There was some discussion about how the chemicals (one being arsenic) in the wood affects the orchid growth.
When mounting a plant, Brian choses a section with 7-8 pseudobulbs and pulls off the lower ones. He then attaches he plant using fencing staples, strips of pantyhose or rings of gemsquash bags.
THE NAMING OF ORCHID PLANTS – Part 1: Orchid species growing in their natural environment. By Peter Greenfield At the plant table last month, during judging, our Emeritus judge, Ann Duckworth urged members to try and label plants correctly, so, rather hesitantly (as I am not a taxonomist) I will try to explain the system of naming plants. The whole system of botanical taxonomy is quite complex in its entirety, but I will attempt to pull out the essence of import to you as orchid society growers. The naming of any living organism is an attempt to show the interrelatedness of organisms, and hence put them into divisions, starting somewhere near the beginning of life formation and then branching out, with each division becoming more specific. Think of it as a (very large) tree of life starting at the trunk and then splitting into various levels of branches eventually ending up with the uppermost twigs and leaves, which are the species. I am not going to dwell on the early divisions, but suffice to say that orchids lie within the plant kingdom and then, as orchids produce fully protected seeds, lie within the angiosperm division of plants as opposed to those with covered seeds in cones (conifers) or spores such as in algae and mosses. The next branch or class is where the angiosperms either have two cotyledons in the seeds (dicolyledons), which also have floral segments in fours or fives; or a single cotyledon as do our orchids, which puts them into the monocotyledons, which members have floral segments in multiples of three. Classes then subdivide into orders which are largely of academic interest, and orders are then divided into families, which is where we prick up our ears, as orchids belong to the family Orchidaceae. Other families which we will be familiar with are the Daisy, Grass, Legume, Rose, Amarylis etc. families (respectively, the Compositae, Fabaceae, Poaceae, Rosales, Amarylidaceae) families. The Orchidaceae are the largest plant family with about 20 000 species lying within it. Next, in numerical order come the Compositae (ca. 13 000 sp.), Fabaceae (ca. 12 000 sp.) and Poaceae (ca. 10 000 sp.). Within the family of Orchidaceae the next split is into sub-families, which Robert Dressler split into five, the Apostasioideae, Cypropedioideae, Orchidoideae, Spiranthoideae and Epidendroideae, but have now been increased substantively. Generally the family names end in –aceae and the sub-families in –oideae, so one does not have to precede these names with the captions of family or sub-family. The next split is into tribe, which is of interest to orchid breeders in particular, as it gives an indication of the ability of orchid plants within this particular division to cross-breed. Now we get into the divisions of particular interest to society members as the next division is the genus (pl. genera), a branch with familiar names to us all, such as Aerangis, Cattleya, Cymbidium, Dendrobium, Vanda etc. 4 July2016
Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
THE NAMING OF ORCHID PLANTS – cont’d
At each finer branch we take, the characteristics of the group become more refined. Historically, plant classification placed the heaviest weight on floral characteristics as these were considered to be more stable over time, than, say vegetative characteristics. Aspects such as the number and nature of pollinia, floral placement and the ovary were used. More recently, an additional tool in the form of DNA analysis has become important, particularly as the number of loci on chromosomes that have changed between related genera and species can be used to approximate the time at which different genera and species diverged, an aspect previously not possible. The new DNA tool has led to great changes in classification with certain species being moved from one genus to another and previous genera being merged, such as Ascocentrum and Vanda being conflated into Vanda. Some of the mergers, I must say do not make a whole lot of sense to me personally, such as the Laelia being merged into Cattleya, as there are distinct differences in the number of pollinia between these two former genera. We have just been through an intense period of ‘lumpers’ in the field of taxonomy and these folk like to put things together. This will inevitably be followed in the future by ‘splitters’ who tear them all apart again. This is all very frustrating for us as orchid growers as we not only need to learn and remember the new names of old familiar plants, but embark on major re-labelling of plants in our collections and their photographic representations. It has also caused not a little confusion in the naming of previously awarded plant clones. Next down there are sub-genus and sections which are not generally in common use perhaps with the exception of large genera such as Dendrobium ( sections of Dendrobium, Callista, Formosae etc.). The next fine branch is the species (pl. species) which in Latin simply means a ‘kind’. Definitions of species are vague and subject to particular taxonomist’s whims. Some definitions are given below to give some idea of this grouping: 1. Groups of actual or potential interbreeding natural populations of plants, isolated from other such groups. The isolation may be temporal or spatial. 2. A naturally occurring collection of plants which can interbreed in nature and bear some resemblance to each other. 3. A group of plants showing intergradations among its individuals and having in common one or more characteristics which definitely separate the group from any other kind of group. One problem with rigid taxonomic definition is that plants like orchids and grasses are naturally promiscuous and at the edges of isolation barriers there is often interbreeding between different species and this causes genetic drift throughout the population. Hence there is difficulty of having any rigid definition of the term ‘species’. Without this genetic diversity, however, there would be far less likelihood for new species to develop, leading to new potential of ‘survival of the fittest’. It may also be noted that the term species only refers to naturally growing populations of plants in the wild, so strictly speaking one wonders if our nursery bred or line bred plant ‘species’ are species in the strictest sense of the taxonomic system. Also, how does one judge one plant within a group of wild (or nursery -grown) orchid species to be ‘superior’ to another? Below the species level are terms in descending order such as sub-species, variety, and form. The latter two terms are often not recognised by taxonomists, but are in common use in the nursery industry. In naming of all organisms, Linnaeus suggested that they all be known by (Latin) generic and specific names, and this is the basis of the Latin binomial system of classifying all organisms eg. Homo sapiens. Because they are in Latin, these names are either underlined in normal writing, or italicised in print, as above. The branch names up to the generic level are written in normal lower case with the first letter being capitalised. From genus down the names are italicised in lower case, and of these, only the genus name starts with an upper-case letter. To summarise, the following scientific classification of Aerangis kotschyana (Reichenbach f.) Schlechter is given.
5 July 2016
Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
THE NAMING OF ORCHID PLANTS – cont’d
Taxonomic Grouping Taxonomic Name Ending Kingdom Plantae Class Monocotyledon Family Orchidaceae -aceae Sub-family Epidendroideae -oideae Tribe Vandeae -eae Sub-tribe Angraecineae -inae Genus Aerangis Species kotschiana You will note that in the full scientific orchid species name given at the top of the table, the specific epithet is followed by (Reichenbach f.) Schlechter. Of the latter two names the first (in brackets) refers to the person under the rules of nomenclature who first published the classification (in 1864) of this plant, who was H. G. Reichenbach who named it Angraecum kotschyanum and the second name is of Schlechter who correctly transferred it to Aerengis in 1918. In orchid societies we usually drop the publishers’ names and simplify it to Aerangis kotschyana. Note that in Latin, names are gender specific, Angraecum is masculine so the specific name ending is also must be in the masculine (-um) while transfer to Aerangis, a feminine vowel necessitated the specific epithet to be changed to the feminine –a. If there were further divisions of this species into sub-species, variety or form, the species name would be followed by the abbreviation of the sub-section – subsp., var. or f. (not italicised) and then the Latin name of the sub-division in italics. eg. Aerangis luteoalba var. rhodosticta. Thus, as far as naming your orchid species for plant table or shows, it is really only the second section of the above paragraph you need worry about. Orchid Wiz and/or Orchids Plus are great tools for finding out the correct names of our orchids following all the reclassification of genera and species that has occurred eg. Oncidium flexuosum is now Gomesa flexuosa. An interesting aspect at last month’s meeting was the plant on display that we all new for years as Oncidium ornithorhynchum. Research into various botanical holdings, however, showed that this name had been given earlier in time to another Oncidium species, then, more commonly known as O. pyrimidale. Thus the rules of nomenclature prevailed, in that this earlier species of Oncidium ornithorhynchum described by Kunth in 1816 took preference of this name. The old species we had known as O. ornithorhynchum had to be called O. sotoanum, as named by Jiminéz & Hágsater in 2010 who had it published under this new name. The specific epithet of this orchid is derived from the person who discovered the error in nomenclature (Miguel Ángel Soto) who was sadly killed at home in a robbery before he could publish his findings. So this name change was necessitated by rules of nomenclature rather than re- classification. We have to be on our toes! The naming of hybrids is altogether another story and will be the subject of a future article. References La Croix, I., 2014. The genus Aerangis. In: Aerangis: Exquisite African orchids to discover, identify and grow. ISBN 13: 978-1-60469-562-5. Timber Press, Inc., London, UK. pp. 14-19. Morrison, G. C., 1982. The orchid family. In: Growing orchids in the southern hemisphere. ISBN 0 86978 2347. Kangaroo Press, Australia. pp. 11- 13. Schelpe, S. & J. Stewart, 1990. Dendrobiums: an introduction to the species in cultivation. ISBN 1 873 03500 4. Orchid Sundries Ltd., Gillingham, UK. 115pp. Zelenko, H. & G. Van Winkel, 2016. Oncidiun sotoanum R. Jiménez & Hágsater 2010. Orchids, 85(3): 208-209, 2016.
Some of the other lovely blooms at the July Plant Table 6 July 2016
Pietermaritzburg Orchid Society
COMMITTEE President – Peter Greenfield 033 386 5617 / 073 505 3568 Vice President – Ann Duckworth 033 396 1796 / 079 775 4299 Secretary – Alison Young 082 406 5638 Treasurer – Mal Renwick 033 3261 857 / 082 489 0674 Caps Senjaveraj 033 343 1906 / 084 529 0185 Donald Ross 082 627 6061 Dave Brennan 082 900 7717 Natalie Blackmore 084 800 6489 Paul Hodkin 033 330 4144 / 082 456 0920 Past President – Frank Berry 033 330 6999 / 073 266 9778
Birthday Greetings Monthly Newsletter to the following members: Any comments, ideas or Christine Tarr 12 September contributions to the newsletter are welcome. Please contact Natalie ([email protected])
I hope that you are all enjoying the articles we are now putting into the newsletter. Please send me anything interesting you read or see, or write an article on your specialty or particular interest. It doesn't matter how long or short. Thank you Peter for the very interesting article this month. Natalie
PRESIDENT’S PUNT We are now within five weeks of the National Show, so it’s all hands on deck. The Show Committee has been busy putting finishing touches to getting the conference brochure and programme as well as the publicity blurb ready to send out to the public and media. Please do your bit by letting everyone you know about the show and asking them in turn to pass it on. Leaflets will be available for members to pass on both at our next Wednesday evening meeting and at the open day at Dunrobin on the 13th. Also, make sure that you put your order in to Alison for the show shirts that we have organised for the show. It will be so important for the public and other orchid society members to be able to identify our group, wearing the shirts, if they need advice or help.
I hope you are also staking all those potential show plants to enable the flowers to have their best display. With the cool and damp weather of recent days we could be somewhat short of plants in optimal condition, so get that wire and tape to work! Remember to clean the foliage and remove all dead leaf and dried leaf sheath as well and clean or disguise that ‘ugly old pot’. Before you know it we will be setting-up shop. We will also need all the help we can get in the hall for setting everything up. If you are not attending the conference, we need you to help in the hall with ticket sales, floor walking and plant sales and advice etc while those of us who are participating in the talks are busy elsewhere. So put your name forward! All the best to you all and your plants for what I’m sure is going to be a very successful event. Peter
7 July 2016