Orchids That Grow Easily From Seed

[epiphyte78]

Originally Posted by camille1585

Orchids that grow well without in vitro techniques are rare. I think most are terrestrial orchids. Vanilla is not one of those rare few as far as I know, though they are interesting in that you can make stem cuttings of vanilla.

When I first started growing orchids nobody told me that there are some orchid seeds that do not require fungus or flasking to germinate. I discovered on my own that reed-stems can easily grow from seed. Then I happened to find this page which shows Epidendrum radicans and Pleione seeds germinating on bark. It says that the seeds germinated because of the presence of fungus. Not sure if this is really the case.

Several years after seeing that page, I incorrectly thought that the experiment was conducted with Bletilla striata instead of Pleione... so I decided to try sowing some of my friend's Bletilla seeds on Sphagnum and they quickly germinated.

Do you know of anybody who has tried to sow Vanilla seeds on Sphagnum moss? I sure don't.

It's definitely the case that most orchid seeds require flasking/fungus in order to germinate. But nobody, as far as I know, has sat down and tried to find all the exceptions to the rule. So there might be far more exceptions than we realize!