Garden Dacts.

[Steve Garvie]

Both Dactylorhiza maculata and Dactylorhiza purpurella grow locally with occasional seedlings appearing in troughs and gravel paths in my garden. I have additionally introduced a few bought plants of foliosa and fuchsii. The interbreeding of all of these Dacts has created a number of variants, some of which are quite attractive up close or en masse.

[Graeme]

stunning

[annew]

Gorgeous - I like the plain white one especially!

[Maren]

Fabulous massed display, so uniform and clean. What's your soil like?

[Steve Garvie]

Many thanks Graeme/Anne/Maren!

Maren the general garden soil is an acidic leafmould-enriched loam with added granite grit. Some of the Dactylorhiza have self-sown into pots/troughs which contain gritty alkaline mixes. Whilst the Dacts grow well in my garden soil it seems not to be conducive to their germination/seedling development.

[Maggi Young]

Quite a few garden Dacts in this week's Bulb Log :
http://www.srgc.org.uk/logs/logdir/2015Jul291438167191BULB_LOG_3015.pdf

[SteveC2]

Very impressive Maggi!  How recent are the photographs?  Mine all finished weeks ago.

[Maggi Young]

Photos are current, Steve C.  The earliest little D. purpurella are past and some of the bigger hybrid dacts in some areas got a bit blown about and battered in the stormy weather we've had but most are still in very good order.  Their long season of flower is one of the reasons we love them so much.

[Tristan_He]

Fabulous. A very underrated group of orchids in my opinion. Shame people aren't doing more work to get good colour variants e.g. white and really dark pink / purple. A 'growable' yellow (i.e. not sambucina) would also be nice.

I find they tend to self-seed either in among fibrous / mossy pond marginals (i.e. permanently wet, but not in soil) or else in neglected pots, not necessarily alkaline though.

[Claire Cockcroft]

Perfect eye candy, Maggi!  This year's dact. bloom in my garden was disappointingly short, due to unusually dry, unusually hot weather in the US Pacific Northwest.  Water restrictions are being discussed in Washington, something I've not seen since I moved here in 1987.  The winter is forecast to be warmer and drier than usual.  Poor plants!