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It is harder to select orchids for your beginning collection than it is to grow them. While growing orchids is a feat of memory aided by experience and common sense, selection requires long association with orchids and long evenings spent studying orchid catalogues. Here are some which you can begin with.

Fragrant Orchids

Few people have made a hobby of fragrant plants. Most of us accept pleasing odors in plants as a matter of course. As a hobby this field is wide open - and extensive. Its only drawback where fragrant orchids are concerned would be finding your home or greenhouse overpoweringly perfumed - which is exactly what would happen, for many orchids have the most powerful and lasting fragrances in the plant world. Their perfumes are heavy, unusual, or exotic. They seem to fill the air of your rooms with the mysteries of the Far East or the enchantments of sundrenched tropical lands.

Most of the scent comparisons listed here are accurate, but some are necessarily approximate. Certain fragrances are tantalizing in their ability to escape identification, and are subject to as many interpretations as there are individuals who have encountered them.

Type of Fragrance Name of Orchid Species

Allspice Gongora atropurpurea

Angelica Epidendrum umbellatum

Citron Rodriguezia Candida

Coconut milk Bulbophylum comosum

Hawthorn Odontoglossum constrictum

Honey Cycnoches loddigesii

Newmown hay Oncidium ornithorynchum

Platyclinis glumacea

Wallflower Gongora galeata

Acropera loddigesii

Orchids Fragrant Only at Night

Epidendrum nocturnum

Brassavola grandiflora

Orchids That Change Their Fragrance

Primrose (morning) Honey (noon) Grass (evening) Dendrobium nobile

Pleasant by day Unpleasant by night Orchis mascula

Decorative Foliage

In any garden a background of foliage is needed to give color between blooming seasons. Unfortunately, lovely foliage is not often produced by orchids. There are few which can serve as background plants when out of bloom. Fewer still whose foliage is in itself attractive. Other than some cypripediums and phalaenopsis, good foliage orchids have very poor flowers.

Description of Foliage Name of Species

Silver and gold veining on Anoectochilus in variety

green and purple leaves

Leaves marbled, grey above, Warm Asiatic cypripediums

purplish beneath, or vari- in variety

ously tesselated

Green leaves veined with Goodyera in variety

white

Bronze-colored foliage Microstylis josephiana

Metallic purple and rose Microstylis metallica

foliage

Leaves marbled and Phalaenopsis schilleriana

blotched with grey above, Phalaenopsis stuartiana

purplish-red beneath

Mimicry in Orchids

There is not always a close similarity between a common orchid name and the insect or object the flower is supposed to resemble. However, without stretching your imagination too far the basic resemblance often exists. In only a few cases is the name purely fanciful.

Common Name Name of Species

Bee Ophrys apifera

Bird’s Nest Neottia nidus-avis

Butterfly Oncidium papilio

Habenaria conopsea

Epidendrum venosum

Cranefly Tipularia discolor

Dove Peristeria elata

Fly Ophrys muscifera

Frog Oncidium raniferum

Peristylis viridis

Letter Plant Grammatophyllum speciosum

Lizard Orchis hircina

Looking Glass Ophrys speculum

Moth Phalaenopsis amabalis

Rattlesnake Goodyera pubescens

Spider Ophrys aranifera

Swan Cycnoches ventricosum

Miniature Orchids

Some people go in for collecting minute curios. Why not miniature plants? There are orchids which when full grown barely reach the stature of an inch, others that do not exceed five inches. Their cost is little compared to that of miniature furniture. Smallness in stature should not be confused with smallness in flowers, although this is frequently true. Laelia majalis may reach only five inches in height, but usually puts out a six-inch flower.

Name of Species Size in Inches

Angraecum articulatum 3-5

Angraecum distichum 1-2

Comparettia (in variety) 5-6

Cypripedium (in variety) 4-10

Dendrobium bellatulum 2-3

Dendrobium loddigesii

Laelia majalis (Syn. grandiaora) 6-7

3-6

Lycaste aromatica 3-5

Restrepia pandurata 3-5

Rodriguezia (in variety) 4-6

Saccolabium bellinum 3-6

Saccolabium calceolare 2-6

Sophronitis (in variety) 2-5

Trichocentrum (in variety) 3-6

There are many more orchids which can be selected, but these are a few which may tempt you.