Dendrobium spectabile
 

This Dendrobium spectabile just opened fully for me after a couple of years of waiting for it to bloom.http://www.orchidboard.com/community...humbs/0195.JPGhttp://www.orchidboard.com/community...humbs/0171.JPGhttp://www.orchidboard.com/community...humbs/0137.JPG

This is a *must* have for me. I just love the blooms from Den. spectabile.
Good growing and thanks for sharing this with us!

That is awesome! Any tips for getting it to bloom? Looks like you're giving it lots of light, must be happy.

These have always interested me and I wondered what these really looked like. I've only seen thumbnails till now. Really like this plant. Yours looks great. Thanks for sharing.

Awesome!! I love these types of Dens, this one has been on my wishlist for awhile. Thanks for sharing!

Dendrobium spectabile is a wonderful one. It's great to see the blooms with the plant for the first time. Great growing :clap:

Truly amazing. Good growing.

If you want a really big robust plant, keep feeding all year long ... robust means 30-40 inches tall before it blooms.
If you would like a more manageable sized plant, keep watering, but don't feed after August (late summer) and continue to give as bright light as you can. The important thing is stopping the feed even from slow release pellets. Plants should initiate spikes in Feb to April on relatively short plants ... maybe 12-16" in 5" pots.

In any case, feed and water regularly May thru summer and grow in bright light. Plants will tolerate temps from 90's down to mid 40's. Best temps mid 50's to mid 80's.

People do love these strange looking fellows.

I love these flowers. I'm going to have to check around and see if I can find one. Will it really reach 30-40' tall or is that inches? Either way you have some great flowers to enjoy!

As you can see i grow this plant right under a 1000 watt sodium about 3 and a half feet away with a fan blowing right across the area so not to heat burn it thats why its light green with some spotting and i gave it 12 hours of light,and 12 hours of dark for three months and then 14 hours of light and 10 hours of dark and into the second mounth it started to show sign of a spike. I've had the plant for three years and when i recieved it it was a foot tall. I'm sure that in a green house it would have grown faster .you can never fully mimic mother nature.

Congradulations 3 years from only a foot tall plant is exceptional. Normally these take 7-9 years to bloom

I used to think the same thing ... but maybe 4-5 years ... plants would grow lots of canes and only bloom when very large.
I had friends with lots of plants blooming very short with 3-4 canes ... in different kinds of climates: cold northern areas, rainy low light areas, warm low rainfall areas. And they all bloomed them short.
The only common denominator seemed to be the feeding schedule. These people only fed a little or at worst stopped feeding at the end of summer.

We tried that and it worked very well ... lots of blooms on short plants.
Grow spectabile in strong cattley light if you've got it. Then water the plants, but neglect the feed so you don't just grow lots of canes.

Very cool flowers, it's on my list too!

The plant is only 23 inches tall .