Hey Helen, some good questions there. You just have to see what works for others. In the UK without a greenhouse or additional lighting I find it is quite challenging to grow some orchids.
The ones that do well in the uk are odontoglossums, phalaenopsis, paphiodeliums and cymbidiums. Those will do best for you long term in the conditions we have.
If you start getting warmer growing orchids in a greenhouse you'd have to start heating the space and heating uses a lot of power.
There is a uk orchid group on Facebook. You have to ask permission to join and you can see what other uk growers are flowering at what time of the year to see what might do well at yours. Stick to what you see others succeed with, there might be some you really fancy and I generally like to challenge myself but there is no point trying to flower something you cannot provide the conditions for. If you can, great, but usually just providing what your house or greenhouse can offer is the easiest long term. To me growing indoors under artificial lighting has opened up lots of new doors. To grow an orchid indoors under LED light uses far less electricity than to do the opposite of growing in a greenhouse, using the free sunlight but having to heat the space in winter. But indoors space is a limitation.
Another reason to go for modern compact hybrids of varieties if one can.
Anything that needs a bit more light really struggles in our cold winters so you should think about supplemental winter lighting for your orchids if you can. That will open up the world of Cattleya's for you.
Without lighting I would be really limited to what I could grow well.
Last edited by Shadeflower; 09-15-2021 at 01:48 PM..
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