Dactylorhizas 2012

[mark smyth]

and three "flowering sized" from another orchid nursery

edited - forgot to take a photo.

[Slug Killer]

Mark

Dact F tuber looks very poor quality and will more than likely die (sorry) as the tuber looks rotting and infected (plant away from the rest of you stock or destroy it, I would as you have too many nice ones to risk it). As for size I'd say both F and F2 are one year out of flask as I removed some last year and they are about the same size as those. Can't really believe anyone would try and pass them off as FS (flowering Size) and If I'd bought these they would have been returned as I'd have thought a genuine mistake had been made or April 1st had come early.

The last set of pictures look a bit better but again I'd say they need another good seasons minimum growth to reach flowering size but they can flower from small plants and at least those look like healthy leaves (FS,FS3). FS2 looks like the strong sun may have damaged the new leaf growth but it is certainly not flowering size.

The pictures of plants you picked up at shows are obviously of much better quality and size.


Dacts can flower from three years in good conditions but I find after removing from flask they take on average 4-5yrs.

[Neil]

Mark

Are they species or hybrids? I ask as I have a number of species that are about that size and they do flower, and they are quite a few years old now. 

[Slug Killer]

Mark

Are they species or hybrids? I ask as I have a number of species that are about that size and they do flower, and they are quite a few years old now. 

Neil

I'm amazed you have them this size and they flower?

[winwen]

and now two flowering sized Dactylorhizas from an orchid nursery

What a pity!
During the last 2 years, I observed that especially Dactylorhiza-bulbs labeled "Flowering sized" become smaller and smaller when you buy it. I guess this might be the case especially if you buy later in the season when all the fat bulbs have already been sold.
Where did you buy these, Mark?

[Jeff Hutchings]

As some of the dactylorhiza mentioned were bought from me I thought I would comment. I buy most of my stock from one breeder who assures me that the tubers have had two years full growth before being sold. These have never and will never be the same size as the limited numbers sold by some nurseries that are "offsets" from mature tubers. I also suspect that the latter often have "foliosa" or "elata" blood in them which is why the tubers are so large.

Also, the tubers of many of the species never grow very large; even after a number of years. Last year I got some fuchsii hybrids that flowered in 7 cm pots suddenly producing flower spikes 20 cm tall from very small tubers. A tuber one year out of flask will usually not have a divided tuber but simply a thin carrot like root.

The major supplier uses a low organic compost and I find that by the time the plants reach me the cream roots and tubers tend to go brown and become patchy brow when planted into the high organic mix I use.

I think there are a number of reasons why the size of dactylorhizas offered has reduced. The summer weather has tended to make the plants go dormant earlier in the past two summers and more important there are far more seed raised plants offered now.

Jeff

[winwen]

Thanks for the info, Jeff!
So the estimation that a plant is FS derives from the age of a plant, not from its size - right?
The more changeable weather has brought problems to all of us (Janis Ruksans might write books about that) because it is much more difficult today to provide stable and suitable conditions for cultivation of many plants.
Therefore I think it would be better to take full account of that and make some adaptions:
If I am going to buy a flowering sized plant, my expectations of the product-quality plays a bigger role than the price. Of course the price is also a criterion for my decision where to buy but it usually does not affect what I am going to buy.
I therefore would suggest to simply adapt the prices of the items and label these according to their expected quality and not based on static criteria (age) that are more and more meaningless due to todays problems.
What do you think about that?

[Maren]

Hi,

in my experience, customers require either:

A) a plant that will flower in the forthcoming season (these are usually more expensive);
B) a plant which they are prepared to grow until it flowers (these are usually less expensive).

For Type A) here is the scheme used by many of us, where the age of the plant is irrelevant:

FS =    flowering size. i.e. capable of flowering in the forthcoming season;
FS-1    needs one more year before it is capable of flowering;
FS-2    needs two more years before it is capable of flowering.

This means that a plant sold as FS can be 2 or more years old and so can an FS-1 or FS-2 if it takes a long time for that plant to get to flowering size.

For type B) where the customer is prepared to grow the plant from young until it flowers, a different scheme is used, for example:

1 year out of flask or
1 year in soil.

This tells the customers something about how to carry on growing the plant, without indicating how many years it may take to flower which, of course, depends on many factors including the characteristics of the plant itself and the care it receives (including climate / weather).

Hope this helps.

[winwen]

Maren, it doesn't help unfortunately!

The point is, that there is -as far as I can see- definitively no common sense about the quality rating of such bulbs because it is not based on facts but only on guessing!
Therefore the label FS alone stands for nothing that I am able to exactly describe in words and such is a permanent source of misunderstandings and disappointments by the customers.

To me, a plant is FS if it HAS ALREADY FLOWERED, it is MATURE if it already has reached its "adult" dimensions and properties for at least one vegetative seasons.
In all other cases the plant is young and maybe rated by age or size and weight of it's tubers.

[SteveC2]

I've been growing dacts for twenty years and one thing that always amazes me is the variability in size of "flowering size tubers".  
My giant is one clone of "Blackthorn hybrid", often incorrectly labelled as "Grandis" but whose parentage is unknown.  Its tubers are the size of a toddler's hand.  To endear it to me even more, it has huge spots on huge leaves, and doubles in number every year without fail.  
My first ever dact was a D. fuchsii, which never once produced a tuber bigger then my little finger, nor reached more than about four inches in height but built into a nice colony of around twenty plants and flowered for me every year for fifteen years before gradually running out of steam.  The colony is now down to six plants, repotting, splitting etc has had no effect on its vigour it just seems to be "old".  I'm told that dact populations in the wild behave similarly and this is always put down to succession, but I'm wondering if it's genetic.  I've had seedling hybrids flower in pots of bletillas and hostas and when I've finally repotted the host plants I've struggled to find the tubers because they were so much smaller than expected.  Equally I have a pot full of D. maculata which flower every year off two inch tubers, producing nice sized plants similar to those in my local wild colony.
Finally I have a veteran clone of the true form of foliosa, just one plant, because despite producing a decent sized plant and flowering every year for the past decade it refuses to produce more than a single replacement tuber, albeit a huge one.  I've just accepted that it will never produce a large display.
Anyway, enough of my ramblings, what is my conclusion?
With dacts, as in so much of life, size isn't everything.  My advice to Mark, who is quite clearly a capable dact grower, would be to grow them on and comment in July, after the flowering season.  Who knows, you just might be pleasantly surprised.

[SteveC2]

Winwen posted whilst I was typing my response, so here's part two.  Your suggestion is fine for calnthes and cypripediums but can never work with dacts, or any of the tuberous orchids, because each tuber will only flower once.  Just because a parent plant flowered it doesn't mean that it will produce a FS tuber.  In fact I've found that the better a plant flowers the less likely it is to produce a big tuber for the next year, or even a tuber at all! 
Labelling a plant FS is not really guessing, it's simply that the grower, using his experience, believes that if grown well, and if the conditions are kind, that tuber is of a size that will flower in the next season. 
And a final observation, if you buy so-called FS tubers and are disappointed, then surely the first point of call is to contact the dealer from whom you purchased and discuss the situation, rather than to launch a discussion like this?  I must say that I admire Jeff for responding to this thread.

[Maggi Young]

And a final observation, if you buy so-called FS tubers and are disappointed, then surely the first point of call is to contact the dealer from whom you purchased and discuss the situation, rather than to launch a discussion like this?  I must say that I admire Jeff for responding to this thread.

Quite so, Steve - and that is a point that has often been made before.  

[winwen]

I also admire Jeff for his decision to take part in this discussion. This is not an easy thing-I know!
All the more because the matters we are talking about are not only his concern but also every commercial plant breeders/traders/growers.....

To make it clear: I am no disappointed customer, I only have ONE central question:
Is there a common understanding of FS-label based on FACTS?

As far as several answers suggest, there are no such facts. I do not rate this at all (good or bad) but the only fact I could find is: FS-label is based only on (not guessing-please apologize my bad English, this was not what I meant!) estimations made by the growers.
Estimations may be good or bad, they may be made by very sophisticated/experienced growers or by bloody amateurs who only call themselves cultivateurs and have never grown anything, BUT an estimation is an estimation and NOT FACT.

Steve, if a plant that you sell has already flowered, wouldn't you tell this to the customer prior to selling it (regardless of wether it will flower the following season or not)? I would find it worth mentioning, because it is a FACT. You wrote that some, if not most, tuberous terrestrial orchids won't flower on two successive seasons in nature. I know this is right, but don't you dead-head these orchids when they start building up a flowering stalk? OK, you wont get any seeds this way, but it is one of the best ways to get really strong tubers the following season. In so far I would find such an info absolutely worth mentioning. Not only because it is a fact but also because it tells the customer more adequate what he will get if he decides to buy a certain plant.
 

[SteveC2]

Just to clarify, I'm not a trader, never will be.  I treat my plants like my "babies" and any potential customers would suffer the spanish inquisition before I would sell them anything.
As for dead heading the likes of Ophrys after flowering I sometimes wonder about the time scale involved with these plants.  I find that by the time the flower is produced the leaves are usually becoming downright tatty and dormancy follows very soon afterwards.  Surely the next year's tuber is pretty much formed by then.  I've not checked as this would involve digging one of the babies up whilst in flower!  To ensure a bigger tuber for the following year I suspect that I'd have to stop the plant flowering altogether which is just silly.

[Slug Killer]

To be fair to Mark he did not complain about any nursery in particular and just said he was disappointed with two out of three he had used and would report back later on how they turned out as he could not believe the size of some plants being sold as FS. It was more of a question and asking others for their input, well that's how I read it anyway. He then put photo's to show the size and later on this year will hopefully show us more growth and if they flowered or not. Sorry but is this not useful information to other forum members or people that have never grown Dacts before, as I was under the impression that's what forums were for? Maybe everyone should just stick to showing pictures and using a 'I'm so happy thread' from now on.

I personally would have contacted the nursery about the very small tubers (which incidentally were not from Jeff) and I also agree with the admiration of others about Jeff coming forward and putting his side across regarding the plants he did sell as his name was not mentioned and he could have sat back and said nothing as I have seen others do in the past.

Winwen - As Steve has said above regarding tubers, corns, etc which is spot on. The same thing applies to Pleione that the grower has to take an educated guess as the old bulb dies away and is replaced with a new one. FS therefore has to mean a plant of flowering size and there is no guarantee it will flower until the new shoot reaches a certain size and even then it can abort. The fact that the old bulb flowered on one occasion is irrelevant as it depends on the size and quality of its replacement. If you want guarantees then you will be buying plants as non flowering from now on as it's impossible to say. The skill of the new grower also has to come in to play and you will find most sales of FS plants are sold as flowering size under ideal conditions.

There has to be some sort of reference guide and although not ideal in every circumstance I think what Maren said above FS,FS-1 and FS-2 is far better than giving pot sizes which many nurseries do or saying it will flower but with no guarantee.