Pics post!

[hcarlton]

With Nep ID posts, who's to say someone doesn't have a maxima but that it's actually some very convoluted mess of fusca, reinwardtiana, maxima, and/or eymae you know? So based on guessing along those lines, totes thorellii. Based on who know what went into it and what the actual DNA of each plant is, you could put quotes around every plant everyone has in their collections. I guess what I'm saying is I still think thor x campy is a good label for it vs. say kampotiana x campy.

The taxonomist in me would have to vehemently disagree with this notion on grounds of known distribution patterns and techniques already in place for labeling unknowns; the Indochinese group was messed up coming into cultivation early on but other species and their traits are fairly clear and better kept for the most part, and unknown hybrids with really complex backgrounds don't tend to be broadly distributed outside a few heavily produced TC plants. You certainly wouldn't confuse a reinwardtiana x fusca cross with a pure maxima etc. and even hybrids with close species (like "Gentle") show clear signals that they are hybrids, and EP's done a few experiments with extreme backcrossing that showed even such introgression shows signals of hybridization several generations in.
With this group, I think the best thing would actually be to label them "sp. Indochina" x campanulata ex., rather than mark it with a known species label, particularly one that we know was not in cultivation until its rediscovery a couple years ago.

Moving on from that though: I've yet to get my Andromeda to flower, I think that's from their being relatively unfed in a slightly overly shady spot though; Cephalotus has been one of my nemesis for a while, and I got some seeds about a month ago that I'm hoping will germinate, but still not holding my breath.

[thez_yo]

The taxonomist in me would have to vehemently disagree with this notion on grounds of known distribution patterns and techniques already in place for labeling unknowns; the Indochinese group was messed up coming into cultivation early on but other species and their traits are fairly clear and better kept for the most part, and unknown hybrids with really complex backgrounds don't tend to be broadly distributed outside a few heavily produced TC plants. You certainly wouldn't confuse a reinwardtiana x fusca cross with a pure maxima etc. and even hybrids with close species (like "Gentle") show clear signals that they are hybrids, and EP's done a few experiments with extreme backcrossing that showed even such introgression shows signals of hybridization several generations in.
With this group, I think the best thing would actually be to label them "sp. Indochina" x campanulata ex., rather than mark it with a known species label, particularly one that we know was not in cultivation until its rediscovery a couple years ago.

Moving on from that though: I've yet to get my Andromeda to flower, I think that's from their being relatively unfed in a slightly overly shady spot though; Cephalotus has been one of my nemesis for a while, and I got some seeds about a month ago that I'm hoping will germinate, but still not holding my breath.

Yes, it's been a good 'argument'. I totally agree with you!

So that whole terrarium of mine is about a foot, cube. The 26W/100W equiv bulb is literally sat on top of it so the plants are just inches from the bulb. I couldn't get queensland dews or cephs to grow for the life of me until I put them in there. I just moved the queensland dews down a few inches instead of sitting on top of 3" pots so they're sitting in the water at the bottom to stay wetter, so we'll see if they do so well being further away or not. They were drying out a little too fast because the water in there was evaporating up and going down the sides of the terra as condensation draining into the bottom. As for cephs they immediately die on me if they're not in there, confirmed with a decade history of that happening. And if I water them at all the top growth all dies back. So, high humidity, couple inches away frrom a bulb, never water them is my advice .

Queensland dews, despite everyone saying they're 'lower' light, I blast em and they bloom all the time. I didn't feed them at all except for maybe 3 flies a piece this year (oops). It seems like I can only ever grow anything (cps or otherwise) if I completely disregard conventional growing advice or do the opposite of what 'they' say lol. I've got one little N.ampullaria in there that's supposedly from ~850masl that didn't look too hot til I moved it in there. It's warmer where I keep the rest of the neps so I'm thinking of moving it out, to make room for a D.adelae that I just got (oops) and hoping that both the adelae survives, and the ampullaria survives the move. I'd think that amp would like it where a clipeata, thor x campy and platychila live better than where an H.minor lives but I can't do plants 'how you're supposed to' so we'll see I guess.

[thez_yo]

So the internet told me aroids want to be in essentially a dirt-y chunky Nep mix so I repotted this morning, and I also put the vanilla in a cocohusk/perlite/peat/sphag mix. I really hope this move doesn't kill everything but considering how bad I am at 'normal' plants lmao... just

[hcarlton]

Vanilla will want something tall and moist to climb, it doesn't really care about what's at the very base; all the aroids I have are in a very aerated standard compost mix, but then they're not philodendrons etc. Vanilla is about the only orchid that seems to be okay with me (though the Masdevallia veitchiana I put in the highland house seems happy again...).

[thez_yo]

I don't really have anywhere to mist plants though, so that's why I'm wondering about that Vanilla. I have some cork slabs but I'm not even sure how I'd rig it up. I'm going to be starting the process to transition my cps out of a small closet/room sorta deal into some of those cheapo wooden plant racks around the house to see how they do, and maybe I need to rig up some tupperware-with-cork-slab thing on one of them. I gotta think through this for sure.

[hcarlton]

Mine's in a greenhouse so I don't mist (and I don't recommend really misting anything unless it's a near-constant light application), but keeping the media moist and not the plant is more important (and also healthier for the plant). If you set them up vertically on dowel backing etc. and then just soak the boards/moss by running water down them that should work.
I need to find a place to set up and mount my vanilla on something larger though, as what it's climbing on right now is fairly small and it's starting to wander up into the Nepenthes above it.

[thez_yo]

Mine's in a greenhouse so I don't mist (and I don't recommend really misting anything unless it's a near-constant light application), but keeping the media moist and not the plant is more important (and also healthier for the plant). If you set them up vertically on dowel backing etc. and then just soak the boards/moss by running water down them that should work.
I need to find a place to set up and mount my vanilla on something larger though, as what it's climbing on right now is fairly small and it's starting to wander up into the Nepenthes above it.

I got some big cork slabs from repotme when they were having decent sales a few years back. Haven't mounted anything to them yet, don't want to think about how much they cost, but maybe I'll figure something out this weekend. I originally wanted to mount my Phals to it but still haven't really gotten a set up for that (like, getting a greenhouse). Maybe I'll do something temp out of bamboo, zipties, cork slabs and sphag this weekend for the vanilla if I become un-exhausted. If it works, I might set up similar for the cute little Monstera collection I've started up. I've recently discovered there's plenty of pretty smaller species in the genus and well... I've got a plant problem lol!