AWARDED PHAL. SPECIES

[weiss]

While doing research on Phal. Species I was just wondering how difficult it is for species to be "awarded"? It appears that mainly hybrids get awarded most often? What % of awards would you guys guess go to the species?

[cb977]

Hi Weiss, welcome aboard!
You've come to the right place for an answer to this question. I, personally, don't have the answer but we have a number of phal experts and AOS judges here at OB so I'm sure you'll soon have an answer.

Have you introduced yourself yet? We'd love to meet you. What types of 'chids do you grow? How long have you been growing? Join us in the chat room sometime. We have a great group of people here, willing to share their knowledge and we have a great time learning.
Hope to see you there

[Oscarman]

It would seem to me that species are not bred to the same degree as hybrids and certainly awarded plants would have to show improvement in the species.

My guesstimate would be 18% of the awards given, go to species plants.

[Phantasm]

I would have to research this at home for an accurate answer, but hybrids account for the vast majority of awards in phalaenopsis. Selective breeding of phal species isn't done is large numbers with the notable exception of phal bellina (violacea) which has several quality awards. and also equestris which has several color forms.
I'll check tonight and get some accurate percentages.

[littlefrog]

Phal. aphrodite, amabilis, schilleriana, and stuartiana have all been extensively line bred in recent decades, if I recall correctly. Some to the point where you probably wouldn't recognize them if compared to a jungle plant. And that is just the 'showy' species that I can remember off the top of my head.

I think that for your typical 'walmart' application, mostly you will see hybrids sold. That is what the breeders are pumping out the most of. But, good phal breeders (I'm not a phal breeder...) should also be doing some selective breeding of species to improve their breeding stock. And the 'real orchid collectors' are always looking for species orchids, so there is a non-trivial market for 'improved' phalaenopsis species. I actually saw a beautiful collection of Phal. aphrodite at one of those big box stores a year or so ago, so even species are sold that way. I should have bought some...

I agree that most awards are to hybrids, and I'll be interested to see the percentages when you look them up, Phantasm. But we get species phals into our judging center, and award them fairly frequently. We probably shouldn't get into the argument about whether line breeding species is really 'improving' things or not, though.

[Phantasm]

Speaking of line breeding species, Littlefrog, that's a lovely phrag bessae in your avatar!

[littlefrog]

Originally Posted by Phantasm

Speaking of line breeding species, Littlefrog, that's a lovely phrag bessae in your avatar!

Ah, now there is a tale of judging error... *grin*

That little guy is the best besseae I've ever seen, at least in person, bar none. And I've seen hundreds if not thousands. I'm sure there are bigger ones (that one is about 8.5-9 cm if I recall, I didn't measure it), but better form? I doubt it. Team passed on it without comment, as far as I know they didn't even bother to do any research. A month later I took two more to judging, got a different team, and an 88pt AM on one and 80 on the other. Two judges scored the 88pt at FCC level, and the probationary on the team was the limiting factor. On that scale, the passed plant should have gotten at least 93pts... *grin* Oh well.

But, not really a problem. I know it is good, don't need to spend 40 bucks on it. And this way it won't die, the awarded ones always die, right?

[Phantasm]

Here are some interesting numbers that I was able to come up with:
the most awarded grexes/species:
1) Orchid World (100)
2) violacea (93)
3) amboinensis (67)
4) equestris (40)
5) Maraldee (38)
6) Sweet Memory (35)
7) gigantea (33)
8) Solar Flare (29)
9) Misty Green (28)
10) Doris (28)
11) Ambo Buddha (28)

14) amabilis
16) stuartiana
17) schillerana

so we have 4 of the top 11 grexes/species were species, and 7 of the top 22 grexes were species.

One thing that is obvious is that the top 4 phal species are highly awarded in large numbers, and have ben linebred to "improve" the quality over time.

This is a bit skewed at the top. However as more plants were included to the top 100 Phals awarded, 17 were species and 83 were hybrids.
When you consider that there are around 60 phal species, and several thousand phal hybrids, the percentages drop considerably.
I wasn't able to obtain the specific percentages, but phals have been awarded about 6800 times by the AOS and the vast majority are hybrids.
Schillerana has 20,987 hybrids in it's progeny, stuartiana has 19,290, amabilis has 24,249, equestris has 15,091, amboinensis has 8,645, and etc.
Of course, some of the hybrids are combinations of these species that are repeated in the progeny.

After seeing the numbers of hybrids that have been created, even though a large number of them have not been awarded there are many that have a few awards.
My guess is that the number of species awards versus hybrids is something around 5% of the total.

[cb977]

for Phantasm!!! What a wonderful job you've done on informing our members...thank you

[weiss]

Phantasm-Thank you very much for your efforts. I really appreciate you thoughtful time and effort.