Pleione identification.

[john hodgson]

Hello pleione lovers. This is my first posting, so may I beg forgiveness if I am doing this in the wrong way.
I currently grow about 80 carefully labelled different pleione hybrids and a few species, but among them I have grown, for many years,a slowly growing crowd of very attractive hybrids once supplied to me as Shangtung 'ridgeway' but clearly aren't (when compared with my S. ducat, my S. silver anniversary and with photos on Paul's and Karel's excellent websites).
They are too nice to reject and greatly deserve a plant label of their own. Can anyone provide any suggestions?

[Maggi Young]

Hello John, super pictures - I hope they will help get an answer for you.

 (I'm moving this to the  Orchid section , where it will better reach the pleione fans ) 

[karel_t]

Hi John,
Nice to hear from you again 
By my opinion this is very old hybrid, I guess P. Rakata 'Excalibur'. Please compare with picture on Paul's websites: http://www.pleione.info/pleione-hybrids-gallery-o---r.html

Karel

[john hodgson]

  Hi Karel - lovely to hear from you again too - and thank you for your reply. I know how subtle a difference in appearance that one pleione can have with another,  so I'm amazed at how close a match your suggestion is. My erroneous "Ridgeway" indeed looks very much like Rainer Kretz's Pl. Rakata 'Excalibur' photograph on Paul's website. I'm mightily impressed by your photographic memory!
I hope you agree that it's a very nice looking plant that's worth keeping - it makes good sized healthy pseudobulbs, the flowers are quite large and hold themselves up nicely.

I have one other pleione without a real name. It was bought from a German commercial supplier. The supplier told me that the parentage was unknown and was just sold with their own commercial name 'rosarot'. Like giving a mongrel puppy a home, I couldn't resist. The flower is unremarkable - very ordinary - reminding me of Pl. bulbocodioides, but in the first year, from one single large bulb it gave 4 flowers with remarkably long scapes or stalks. It multiplied very well. Strangely, the second year they were a more ordinary height and the flowers were covered more extensively with spotting. (The long stalks might have made them useful for breeding). I wonder why the flowers should look so different in spotting from one year to the next? As for height, they grew both years in the same lighting conditions - a shaded cold green house - so another mystery.
These are: 1)&2) single pseudobulb 2014   3) the 2015 clones.     

[ashley]

Gosh John, progressing from a single pseudobulb (albeit 'XXL') to such a fine potful in a year is very impressive.

[karel_t]

Hi John,
There is very difficult for these pale "commonly pink" plants to identify the hybrid name. We maybe can see here the markings of  P. formosana or P. bulbocodioides, however it may not be the F1-hybrid.
As for the difference of height, vitality and colour, it is usually a matter of nutrition. Fat bulbs (XXL size) very often produce huge and multiple flowers. When the bulbs "slim down" to standard size, the flowers show the right size, shape and color, however you may find some small differences from year to year.
So, I can't help you in this case. Sorry 

Karel

[john hodgson]

Ashley - although I don't know the parentage, and as Karel points out, will never know its heritage, it's still worth growing because of its health and vigour. The bounteous potful is down to that vigour and the original size of the bulb. All my pleiones stay in the shaded green house only until flowering is finished and leaves start to grow. From May onwards most are outside. I keep them in well drained plastic pots, on  north facing tables surfaced with polythene then covered by capillary matting, so that I can safely leave them for weeks on end. Summer rain seems to be enough for most of them to thrive... including this one. The tables are caged to keep out blackbirds that will turf them out given half a chance. The 2014 single XXL bulb is now 7 large bulbs and a few little ones. I can't really claim the credit.

[ashley]

Thanks for outlining your regime John; such an excellent result must surely reflect skillful growing too. 
As a relative beginner I'm reassured that your method is quite similar to mine, but my increase is far short of that and clearly I have a lot to learn.

[john hodgson]

Hi Ashley - as a new grower you may well get hooked as I have become. I have made / will make plenty of mistakes.  So don't give up. I got my first pleiones around 1995 when I first came across them at Harrogate spring show.  My first was Stromboli 'Fireball'. For a decade or more I grew this in ordinary potting compost...  NOT recommended! However, by luck, this variety seemed pretty bullet-proof, and except in very wet years, it did well enough (and as a faithful friend is still a favourite of mine.)

Much later I began to add to my first 2 or 3 varieties and pretty quickly discovered that that kind of soggy treatment was sure death - or at least very detrimental - to other types. I changed my ways, and still need to experiment and learn (hopefully without too many expensive or treasured pleione losses). My growing media is now - roughly speaking 60% potting bark (Melcourt) which I sieve through a fine riddle to remove fine particles and 10% supercoarse perlite (also sieved) - keeping the fine perlite for other seedling mixes. The rest is chopped moss worked into the top half only. I find that moss in the bottom gets soggy.  I sometimes add a few pine needles and a little leafmould at the top... but who knows. I drill extra holes in troughs but have also been lucky enough - a few years ago - to buy 2nd hand from a nursery some excellent 15cm tall, 8x8cm square plastic pots with a grill at the bottom instead of holes.
Last year, with a big bed of a single variety (size fs-1) growing in a raised bed, I experimented with no feed at all for half of them and half strength Tomorite liquid fertiliser for the other half bed, once a fortnight from August onwards. I can't say for sure I saw a huge difference. I'm going to try another trial this year doing the same thing but starting in July with weaker but more regular liquid Growmore.
I'd be interested to hear other people's views on fertiliser.