Comments on: There must be somebody else there besides your wife

There must be somebody else there besides your wife

substrate — Sat, 15 May 2004 12:40:18 -0800

The orchid, I think is the most beautiful variety of flower. If not for my black thumb I'd gladly devote some time to growing this gorgeous flowers. The main link is to the Internet Orchid Photo Encyclopedia. There's apparently a cultural phenomena involving orchids that even includes tails of theft. A case of Nicaraguan theft has even been likened to rape. NOVA has done an episode on it, which sadly I haven't seen. They're an amazingly diverse species.

By: schlaager

schlaager — Sat, 15 May 2004 12:48:08 -0800

Isn't the Orchid Thief the book that turned into the movie Adaptation?

By: onlyconnect

onlyconnect — Sat, 15 May 2004 13:00:55 -0800

Yes, though the adaptation was less than faithful. Great film in its own right, though. The link to the Kenya trip on that first link is pretty rich with beautiful wildlife and culture photos. Thanks, substrate -- I love orchids, too.

By: obfusciatrist

obfusciatrist — Sat, 15 May 2004 13:19:09 -0800

When I worked the science desk at the University of Hawaii library we kept most of the major bromeliad resources behind the desk to prevent theft and mutilation.

By: bingo

bingo — Sat, 15 May 2004 18:56:41 -0800

Black orchids are the only way that Basil can survive.

By: Sidhedevil

Sidhedevil — Sat, 15 May 2004 20:00:47 -0800

I like the typo "tails of theft" an awful lot.

By: vers

vers — Sun, 16 May 2004 06:12:57 -0800

Thank you for linking to a site I had missed, Substrate. I'm partial to cymbidiums, and have found them to be both forgiving and rewarding plants - I have two that are currently in bloom that were purchased as seedlings from Casa de Orquideas (commercial site, but lots of orchid eye candy goodness).

By: jfuller

jfuller — Sun, 16 May 2004 07:41:02 -0800

Can anybody explain why all the cheap plant places like Home Depot are full of live orchids these days? I was interested in them long ago when they were considered rare and, well, not exactly hard to grow if you read some minimal instructions, but definitely hard to propagate. Has there been some sort of orchid-cloning breakthrough that suddenly made propagation easy?

By: vers

vers — Sun, 16 May 2004 08:23:09 -0800

Two words: tissue culture.

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Sun, 16 May 2004 12:15:55 -0800

vers: wow. So in nature, orchids need their seeds infected by a fungus if they're going to be viable? That sort of specialization is just mindblowing.

By: vers

vers — Sun, 16 May 2004 13:26:48 -0800

Not quite as specialized as it may seem at first glance, FFF - they are everywhere ;) Also, of course, in the wild the fungus is already present in the soil around the parent plant - how this whole pest/host relationship began is beyond my guessing, though. Neat though, isn't it?

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Sun, 16 May 2004 18:33:23 -0800

I know the fungus are everywhere. It's that the seed embryo itself needs the fungus. It's sterile until the root fungus makes it up the plant and into the seed. That's very cool.