mini maniac
 

a few weeks ago i came to love mini orchids at our society meeting. i am looking to get the following next:
Barbosella dussenii
Oberonia nitida
Ornithocephalus iridifolius

i dont have a lot at the moment but i am open to suggestions of what to buy next

Oberonia nitida? Interesting. I have one, however received it misidentified (as most Oberonia). Do you have a picture of that plant? Is someone selling it under that name? Just wonder whether it actually is O. nitida or something completely different. Source for Oberonia is pretty much random. The most common available species are O. rufilabris, O. setigera, O. cylindrica, and O. myosurus/cavaleriei. The remaining 296 species (or so) are just lucky accidents.

Do you have Parsons & Gerritsen's Compendium of Miniature Orchid Species? If not, get it. For what it is, it is a steal.

If you like long pendent spikes with lots of flowers, Also consider Notylia, Notyliopsis, Zygostates.

Barbosella is fun, can take a while to get it happy, but if happy will put on a show for you. Barbosella is in the pleurothallids, so lots of others in that group, including Stelis with (mostly) long inflorescences with many flowers (except for S. uniflora with single flower per inflorescence; super cute).

photo1: barbosella dusseni
photo2 and 3: oberonia nitida

This actually is O. nitida. VERY cool! Do you mind telling who has any available? There is very little information available on the species. I only have the original description by Seidenfaden (1971) from 600 m in Thailand. I had it flowering in Jan and Oct (California), which is the only available phenology data. From when is that picture? Is it taken in South Africa, i.e. S hemisphere?

I am working on a monograph of the genus, so look for information on any odd species. Thanks!

Nice ones!

Afri Orchids has some for sale. the man who owns the nursery, Lourens Grobler has always sold me good quality plants. He lives in Nelspruit, in the Mpumulanga. O and he is very friendly, you have to email then for international shipping. If you go through there list and see a species worth growing, let me know, dont know every species yet. :biggrin:
In his gallery he has a photo from a 2009, 2010 flowering

Thanks for the info, I will contact them. I've never imported any orchids from abroad, and don't think I will try it on my own. This can go wrong so many different ways. The cavaleriei they have is correct, the sp. Thailand, I don't recognize off the top of my head. That will require a bit more digging. Thanks for the pointers! Much appreciated.

Re other species, I like Ornithophora radicans. Eria amica is gorgeous but rather short lived. If you like Oberonia, you may also like Liparis; once they get going they are quite productive. Just a few the struck my fancy. I also don't know what you consider "worthy". Long lasting flowers? large flower compared to plant? Botanical oddities? Scent? I'm mainly into weird botanicals.

Weird plants I love aswell

For weird ones, look for Dresslerella, and I also like Diplocaulobium, which flowers mostly for only part of one day, so you can never bring it to an evening society meeting or include it in a show. Pleurothallis sarracenia is also cool.
Not a miniature, but Pleurothallis pectinata always gets some points for being odd-ball.

Cool plants