Orchid Show

Yesterday, tired of trimming horse hooves and shoveling manure... and just plain tired... I called friend Velta and said "Want to go to the Orchid Show and Sale in Salem, today?" Velta, also tired, said "Sure!" So Nightingale did not get her hooves trimmed. Unless I can come up with another excuse, she will today.

I needed more potting medium for my orchids. At least, I will someday because I'm out. This show comes only once a year. And I missed Velta's birthday and owed her a lunch. All lovely excuses for ditching work. We headed for the Sale room first. It was full of blooming and not blooming orchids. A feast for the eyes. I had thought about bringing my camera but did not, which I regretted when we finally made our way to the Show area. Wow! What amazing orchids were on display.

Of course, I bought more than planting medium. After all, how could I put photos in a blog about the show if I had no photos of orchids? For the first time ever, I bought a Cattleya. I love the color. Because I've never grown Cattleyas before, I also picked up the culture sheet for them. Well, one thing leads to another and I bought a thermometer with hygrometer to mount near the kitchen window, where my orchids live, to try to make sure the humidity is correct for my "corsage orchid".
The Portland Orchid Society had some "rescue orchids" they were selling very cheap. So I bought a Phalanopsis, which is what I usually get because they seem to survive my care, or lack of, the longest. And their flowers last for months.


Before adding the new orchids to the ones already on the kitchen window ledge, I cleaned off and examined the old orchids to make sure they had no bugs to transmit. One did and so it has been banished to the greenhouse and debugged. To my surprise, another of the resident orchids has a tiny flower stalk just beginning. It will be fun to watch it develop. Gardening, says my friend Yoko, teaches us patience. Alas, it does not teach me well enough as I was not willing to wait for my own orchids to rebloom and bought blooming ones instead.

It's not as though nothing is flowering around here. Something is always in bloom in the greenhouse, even in the dead of winter. Right now, the Clivia are in full flower and really quite gorgeous. But they don't fit on my kitchen window ledge. How's that for an excuse?