Bloom Event - Laeliocattleya Gold Digger

This plant never fails to perform. It seems an easy grower and a regular bloomer. They are not large flowers, by Cattleya standards, but what it lacks in size it makes up for in colour, with the striking yellowish orange. It seems to be an unspoken rule among Cattleya that the brighter the colour, the smaller the flowers tend to be (and usually, though not in this case, the size of the plant as well). The smaller flowered hybrids tend to have more flowers per spike, though and are more likely to have interesting markings. There are quite a few cultivars of LC Gold Digger around, but I wouldn't like to attempt to guess at which one my plant is. If any of my readers know for sure, please do leave a comment below.

While my back has been turned, it appears that the taxonomists have been at it again. This plant should now correctly be labelled as Cattlianthe Gold Digger. I'll have forgotten that by tomorrow. I shan't be in a rush to change any labels as I've no doubt that there will be yet more name changes in the future. I always said taxonomists need an eye keeping on them. Laeliocattleya Gold Digger (as was) was registered way back in 1974 and is a hybrid between two hybrid parents. Its complex genetics are the very thing that makes it so easy to grow, a phenomenon called hybrid vigour.

This is rapidly growing into quite a large plant, and has already been both potted on and divided a couple of times. Next time, I shall just cut the rhizome behind the leading four pseudobulbs to encourage the plant to make new growth from the back, and give me more flowers (at the moment there is only one lead, so only one flower spike at a time).

The one annoying thing this plant seems to do is that the pseudobulbs crack as they swell towards maturity. Not that it is a particular problem as I don't show my plants, but I do worry that it might let an infection in at some point. None of my other Cattleyas do this, just this particular one.

As ever, it is potted in coarse bark chips. I really have found that Cattleya do much better in a coarse medium with growth being stronger and roots being less inclined to wander. There is a new generation Cattleya that are really diminutive (full flowering size at only a few inches tall), a couple of which have found their way into my collection (a particularly vibrant one will wend its way onto this blog in the coming week), and these do fine in medium bark chips.

This hybrid carries a very pleasant fragrance which is, at least to my nose, reminiscent of roses although it isn't overpowering (at least not compared to the other very overpowering things also in bloom at the moment).