I've been keeping busy lately, making lots of crosses and flasking. The photo at the top here shows a shelf full of jars housing the 'infants'. Some of these are crosses I made, some are species grown from purchased seed. Here's a little secret for you - most crosses fail in some way or another. Out of 26 hybridization attempts in the past two years, twenty failed to produce seed. Mainly this happens by just not making a mature pod, failing very early, but there were a couple that carried a reasonable looking seed pod for months only for me to split it and find it was empty later. Of the 6 remaining, one failed to germinate, two were contaminated (@$#! fungal spores in dry seed), and three grew nicely.
Among these three that grew nicely is Paph. (Pucks Apple x gardineri). There are 8 pots of these among the group of flasks recently potted out to community pots. This cross has been growing so fast. If they continue to do well, I'll begin making seedlings available in the spring, though I may make a small flask available before then. I'm hoping they continue to be speedy, so that we can see them bloom in a couple years.
