Longwood Garden's ORCHID CONSERVATORY Tour — Ep. 309

Last week we walked through the halls of Longwoods Conservatory but skipped the orchid house because we felt this one deserved its own showing. I synced up with orchid extraordinaire Greg Griffiths for a tour and even went behind the scenes to see the thousands of orchids they grow, hybridize, and showcase in their greenhouses. How did you get into orchids for us? So I went to college at Westchester University and a friend there introduced me to orchids and I was like, why do we care about these purple flowers? What's the big deal? And then I started reading about them. Were you studying as a botanist? Oh no, no. I was studying music education. I was going to be a choral conductor or something like that. And so I started reading about them. I found out they were epiphytes. They grew on trees. I had no idea epiphytes even existed. And so once I knew that, I started reading more. We started growing plants in our respective dorm rooms. We got memberships, student memberships here. Oh my God, you went all in. Oh yes. Well, that's typical of my personality. So we'd walk through the old orchid house and go, wouldn't it be cool to grow these plants? Never having dreamed that one day I'd actually be here doing that. Fascinating. So I ended up working full-time at a nursery about an hour north of here growing orchids right out of school. I had been part-time helping them scrub algae off the walls and the floors. They taught me and I read. I graduated. They sold the nursery and the new owners hired me. Wow. And the rest is history. Well, the rest is history. And this orchid house didn't exist before 2022, right? There was a history of orchids here at Longwood, but there was a sleepy time, I guess. Yeah. We renovated or reimagined this entire space. So we're standing in what would have been the original orchid house through this doorway. Actually, you can see the concrete pad is the outline of the old alcove, and there would have been orchids in there. Then this would have been the orchid house proper. These cases would have moved one column back. Okay. And this square on the front would have been the entire orchid space. Wow. It's small. It was small. But you could pack a lot of orchids in one. Yeah. We fit probably 200 to 250 plants in that space. So when we knew the West was changing, they were going to completely renovate this house, from the ground up, repair everything. It was the only greenhouse in the conservatory that had never been touched. And so it needed some just structural, infrastructural things. And we said, well, if we're going to take it all apart, can we change some things? And so we developed a design team in-house. We sat down, we came up with ideas, and we designed essentially what we're standing in. And so it was down for a little bit more than a year. And then this past a year ago, March, it opened up as the new orchid house. And it is the perfect epitome of Longwood, the historical, classic, original, completely re-imagined with innovation and improvements that were needed, and that kind of pushed the boundaries of what's been done before. These are the original bronze cases that were made in the early 1930s, 40s, that were completely renovated. They took them all apart, piece by piece. I mean, they're exquisite. They are exquisite. They cleaned them, then they put them back together on site, piece by piece. And the glass wall that's above them, in the early 1920s, that glass wall existed and had come down as the house had changed and never gone back up. So when we designed this space, the architects suggested using it to create a vestibule out here to protect the orchids when these doors operate to go to the new West Conservatory. Well, this is exquisite. We'll do this so it has a little bit of a grand entrance. Absolutely. That's the idea. This house is much bigger than the original one was, which is great because before you felt like you're standing on top of people. Now you can have five, six photographers in here, 20 people, and you still feel like there's room. Right. Although the time we came, it was right when I feel like it first opened up and I was swimming between human bodies. That first few weekends were definitely busy. And we had this bench made so that it has a museum feel. So you can sit here and admire the orchids and spend time here, which previously was hard because it was small and there was a lot of people moving through. Yeah. Well, take us through some of them. What are the ones that you curated here that you enjoy? So there are, I mean, we could talk about any orchid here and tell the story of it. We'll start with this little guy. So this is Past Spice Reunion, which comes from Southeast Asia, India, you know, you can see Myanmar, China. This plant came to us from the 70s, which is before Cites. Do you know Cites? Yeah, Cites. Anything that is going extinct or endangered, you can't trade it. Right. And orchids got put on that list. So this is pre-Cites. And this plant actually came from India and was sent to us. And the story goes of the first Spice Reunion go back to when Sander was alive. If you know Sander, King of the Orchids, there was a plant that was sent to Europe to this woman from her brother who was down in Myanmar. And she wouldn't say where it came from. And she sold it to Veatchin Company and they could trade a division of it for its weight in gold. And Sander was not a man who didn't get what he wanted. So he had lunch with the lady and he avoided orchids and discovered that she had a brother down in Myanmar running a tea plantation. So he sends one of his orchid hunters to learn the tea industry in Myanmar and not to talk about orchids. What a roundabout way. Yes. Yes. He was known to get what he wanted. Well, eventually the brother slips and says, you know, he sent his sister this plant, it's causing all this stir. He says, well, I got it from up north at the border of Burma. And it's a terrible place. Tigers in the jungles. You know, the locals are not friendly. They do not like, you know, foreigners coming through. So the next morning, the orchid hunter is gone. And so he hunts and he climbs and he finally comes through a clearing on the side of this limestone cliff. And there's thousands of past Spice Reunion. So he goes to the villagers and says, hey, can I hire you? Help me get these out of the jungle. And they said, OK, we will. But first you have to kill the tiger that's been marauding our village. So he sets up camp, stays a couple of months, hunts, finally kills the tiger. They help him carry him out. And to give you an idea of what was there in that time, later that year, Sanders sold over 40,000 plants of Spice Reunion at auction in Europe. Right. Which, of course, is not good. Which is why things like Cydees exist now, you know. Yeah. But but really pretty neat. And this is a really good example of sort of the wild type that they would have been seeing. Right. Back in those days. And the stories that come with it. Yes. Come on. This one's also exquisite. Look at the kind of vignettion on that one. Paphenustum often people say has a brain pouch. Yeah, brain pouch. It does look like that. Yeah. Lots of really beautiful little Paphiopedilum species. Do you know how half pollination works? No, tell me. So what happens is the in the center of the flower there is a staminodal shield. And whatever it mimics, that's what the insect's going for. But they're often smooth and flat. And so the bug can't hold on. He tries to land. He falls into the pouch. No insects can affect a helicopter takeoff. They can't go straight up. Right. So he can't fly out. The only way out is to climb up. There's little hairs in the back of the pouch that form a ladder and as he goes out the back there, he has to pass by the stigmatic surface and the pollen from this plant and pollinate the plant as he exits. Yes. Trickery. Yes, indeed. And that's basically how most of the pouched orchids are being pollinated. And then you have some Cattleya hybrids. Cattleyas were really important to Longwood. Yes. Yes. Actually, the cases are a great example of that. We have historically kept one purple and one white because at the time when Alice and Pierre started collecting, they were primarily the most common orchid were cut flower corsage Cattleya. Right. And they were primarily white and purple because those were the colors that flowered at the right time of year for Christmas, Mother's Day, New Year's, Easter, things like that. And so a lot of the first plants that Alice and Pierre were getting that were hybrids that weren't necessarily species from the wild were cut flower Cattleyas in pinks, purples and whites. And so we have about 2000 Cattleya that basically form the core of our collection. Right. So I notice you have them like in your in pots here. So when they're out of flower, you just kind of swap them out. Exactly. I feel like that's a little easier than having to move the palms out of the definitely a lot easier, a little less heavy lifting. And when we designed it, we designed this display to be totally flexible. So not only can we change out plants and pots, but we can actually remove the rings from the wall. So you take this plant out, you want something smaller there, you can slot a smaller pot right into the wall. So literally the entire display can be changed. Right. Any day of the week. I like also that you have some of these that have a little bit more, I would say, like insignificant blooms compared to others, you know? Yeah, we we want to show the full breadth of the orchid world, which means having really big, showy, fantastic Cattleya hybrids, but also having, you know, intricate, you know, unusual species like, you know, and this Dendrobium gracilamum, its flowers only last about a week or two. So they're not here long. And we have some things that only last a couple of days. Right. But we make sure we get them out because I want people to walk in and say, wow, I've never seen that before. Or that can't be an orchid. You know, that that's a great response. I kind of want to go back to this because the color of this is yes. And there's a couple others here. This one is starting to get a little older. There's one over here that actually shows the color better. OK. Yeah. It's dark. Yes. This is what most people would say was the first real man-made hybrid black orchid. Really? OK. There's maybe one or two species that in the wild have a black color and they are essentially hyper condensed crimson or purple. And this is hyper condensed crimson. That one's starting to get a little more reddish. Exactly. Purple. And you can see it. Yeah. But yeah. So this is Fred Clark Yara After Dark SVO Black Pearl. And it was the first like big, wow, black human-made hybrid. And since then, Fred Clark has taken it and run and made many more hybrids that are doing the same thing. He's improving on shape and size. And it's a phenomenal breeding program. And this is even like darling. I mean, yes. So I love Mastivalia. They're known as like the gems of the Andes. This is a what I would call a standard or like a large hybrid. But some of them have tiny flowers and just very intricate details, which are really nice. Are these also the ones that are called dancing ladies or no? Dancing ladies typically are like usually yellow on cydium. So this is let's see if there's another around. But because that almost looks like a dancing it looks like yes, it does. Yeah. And dendrobium do have a similar inflorescence habit in some cases to on cydium. I don't know if we have a real classic dancing. It might not be in bloom or whatever. Yeah, we I think some. Oh, here's one actually right up at the top over there. Yep. The yellow one. That's that's the more cliche, you know, dancing lady type that, you know, standard big lipped yellow on cydium. This is unusual. It's on our back over here. Look at this. Yeah, it's really unusual. Do you know the genus dendrocylum? No. So they've recently that it says red meat. I mean, it looks like that, isn't it? So when we go to the greenhouse, if you remind me, I'll show you a species of dendrocylum that literally looks like a grass. The leaves are so skinny. Dendrocylum is a really cool genus from sort of the the belt along the top of the southern Southeast Asian countries, you know, right above like India, Myanmar, over to China. And there's hundreds of species in the genus. They stopped naming them at some point because there's so many that look similar. But some of the call outs are things like that, Wenzelii, which just. Unreal. Yeah. And we have Wenzelii is most commonly red, but there's also orange and yellow forms. It's a really neat plant. I have still in our collection about 60 plants that are antique from Pierre Dupont's time. And some have been lost. But we still have about 60 of the original collection that Pierre would have held in his hand, so to speak. And I know one of them is over here. Come this way. This is a red riding hood. And this would have been here when Pierre was alive. And it's a really good example of early Adontoglossum oncytium breeding for red color. And so this is the original. It's not like something that you've brought back. Right. OK, this is the original. So interesting. Orchids can technically live forever. Yeah. Every new growth is basically a new plant. And so as the old growths die, new ones form. And even though the tissues all relatively new, the genetic material is the same that was here, you know, 80, 100 years ago. Yes. So we have a fair number of complex paths here. And that was actually in Hawaii when I worked there. What we bred primarily were complex paths. And you can't imagine the best ones, how big and round they are. Just incredible. This is a nice example of spotted breeding with those jelly spots on the dorsal sepal. And then I kind of bumped in the back of the Ludisia. I mean, yes, in full bloom. I know a lot of people don't care as much about the flowers as much about the leaves in these cases, but it's pretty cool when it's all in bloom. And Ludisia discolor is one of the exceptions to the rules. So most orchids have or all orchids have bilateral symmetry, right? Just like the human face. If you put a line down the middle, each side is the same. But Ludisia discolor does not. It's a it's off kilter. Almost like like the leaf of a begonia or something. It's not right. Right. It's asymmetric. Exactly. Yeah. And nobody quite knows why. Interesting. They've looked and they haven't found a reason. So what are some that we have over here? So so this dendrobium mini is an example of some Australian dendrobium breeding hybridizing, which is really nice because they're really tough plants. They can take a lot of sun, a lot of warmth, a lot of food and water in the summer when they're growing. And, you know, just some really neat, beautiful little petals there. How does pollination happen here? So for the most part, we don't want our plants to get pollinated because if they do, the flowers die. Right. But we are working on a number of orchid breeding programs. So when we go down to the greenhouses, you'll see I have seed pods everywhere. And so I'm I'm doing all of that pollination to, you know, put specific sets of genes together to try to create predictable outcomes. But by and large, we try not to let things pollinate the orchids out here. So they last as long as possible. Although the catlea are so effective at attracting bees that our honeybees often try to pollinate them. They're a little too fat to get in, but we have many attempted pollinations. And some of the things that are pollinated by like fungus, fungus, gnats or things like that, they'll get pollinated here, too. I mean, there's only so much. It's like you have a porous area, absolutely. But a fungus gnat is like impossible. Right. Exactly. Yeah. But yeah, by and large, we don't see too much pollination here, which is nice because it helps the flowers last the longest. Here's another one of these guys. Yes. So bizarre looking. Isn't that incredible? Yeah. Oops. That's OK. Those flowers are fading. So you mentioned the greenhouses. Are they like that's where you're doing a lot of the mad scientist kind of work and then you bring some here and that kind of stuff. OK. Yeah. So basically what happens is as things come into flower in the greenhouse, they'll get staked ahead of time and then they'll get harvested. They'll get brought up here. What's fading here will get pulled out. They'll get switched out. And then what's fading from here will get returned to the same exact place it came from in the greenhouses. Got it. When we get down, I'll show you our system. My mad scientist system for how we do that. But we have a team of about 26 volunteers whose only job is changing out the display, preparing plants for display, putting them back in the greenhouses. And I have a part timer who manages that whole process. Got it. It was wonderful because it's a lot here before we actually go and see. This one looks like wax. Like, yes, I guess it's candle wax. And that's they're known as the bulldog path. The bulldog because that's big, you know, round face. But yeah, the heaviness of them is quite something right beneath it. This is a hemantaglossum, which is a European and Mediterranean terrestrial. So it actually grows outside in those places and it goes dormant in the summer when it's hot. And then in the winter, when the rain starts and it cools down, it grows when conditions are more favorable. We have a number of terrestrials from that region that we're growing. We're trying to increase the terrestrials that we have to show people because most people don't see terrestrial orchids frequently. This one is pretty. Oh, this Mastivalia. Yeah. Yeah. So when we look at Mastivalia, we have all different kinds. And this is a simultaneously flowering multi floral, which obviously just has an incredible effect to it. And this would be pollinated by something like a fungus net in the wild. And this is a species. And these two with the lips. Yeah. Unreal, right? So this is actually in the same family as Mastivalia. Okay. They're in the plurothalatinae. And we have nearly the entire genus here, which is a really cool thing from a conservation standpoint. And the taxonomy of the genus is a little muddled. So we're hoping in time to leverage the, you know, view we have of the whole genus to help to clarify it. But they're lovely little plants. And it's suspected that at the ends of the petals, there's those little globules, osmophores, that they may actually emit like a slight pungent fragrance that actually draws fungus nets in, but which you and I can't smell. Yeah, obviously. Yeah. And not necessarily in Longwood either, where it's like a mix of fragrance everywhere. Yes, exactly. This room often has this conglomeration of subtle floral fragrances from all the catlea and the obsidium and everything else. Well, should we go check out the greenhouse? Sure. Oh, you know what it is? It's lunchtime. They're having a lunchtime meeting. Let's start down here. Okay. You can edit it however you want. So we have three backhouses. Okay. A warm, an intermediate, and an air-conditioned cold-growing backhouse. Got it. So we'll start in the cold backhouse. Okay. Since we just came out of the cold. Yeah. And what's really neat is there's a lot of orchids that grow high elevation that you can't necessarily cultivate, you know, in Pennsylvania without cooling of some sort. And so we have a massive air conditioning system that air conditions this greenhouse. So it's currently in the low 60s right now. Okay. Well, that's not that bad. No, not that bad at all. And we share this with research. So the front benches here are researches. These are Blotilla that Dr. Peter Zale, our curator, he's been breeding Blotilla for over a decade. Wow. And so this is some of his breeding here and some other research trials. And then the rest of it pretty much is orchid collection. So the Restrepia that you were looking at up there. Right there. Here's the rest of the collection. And you can see there's some really neat individuals in this group. Right. So this is the one that you have just about every genus. Yeah, nearly every species. Yeah. And we have a couple of the type plants that were, you know, the first ones found. Yeah. Which is pretty neat also. So we have those in here and the Miltoniopsis growing here and some of the cool growing on Sidone. We have the Deesa. Are you familiar with Deesa? No. So Deesa is a South African terrestrial that grows near Cape Town primarily on the tabletop mountain there. Deesa Uniflora. And there's about seven species that can all breed together easily and they all grow the same way. And so in the 60s, our director went to Kirsten Bosch's Golden Jubilee and brought back like 12 plants of them. And the grower at the time learned how to grow them and cultivate them. And most orchids, the seed has to be sown in a laboratory, right? Because you need a sterile environment and agar jelly to germinate. But Deesa seed has a residual endosperm. So it will germinate on damp sphagnum moss. So this tray is all of my breeding from last year. And we've been breeding and growing Deesa here since the 60s. Last year we registered, or two years ago, we registered three hybrids in Deesa. The first official Longwood registered hybrids. These are all this year's seedlings coming up to flower. And then these are all my breeding plants. And I can send you pictures. The sepals are actually the most attractive part. So it basically looks like a triangle. Three big sepals and then the petals are tucked up under the dorsal sepal and the lip is like the stigil. You barely notice it. But the dorsal sepal has lots of patterns and has a little nectary on the back because they're butterfly pollinated. So the butterfly lands to get the nectar and the pollen and the stigma are right in the center of the flower and his chest hits them and the pollen sticks. And that's how pollination happens. Yeah, it's really amazing. Butterflies are not usually great pollinators of certain plants, but in that case it is. Yeah. And it seems that the colonies that are down there seem stable. So for whatever it's worth, it does seem to be working. But it's a really neat group for us that's been very historically important. Yeah. And not a lot of people grow Disa around the world. You know, I have a couple people that I share with, you know, on the West Coast or we're trying to work with some people overseas and whatnot, but it's relatively rarely seen genus. So it's a nice thing to have it here. Yeah. And then so this house back here in the summer will get to a maximum of 68 degrees Fahrenheit. So it stays nice and cool. Yeah. This is where all the mastivalia live and the other like Andean cloud forest plants. And these trays up here, those are breeding that I've done. Yeah. So these are some of our seedlings that hopefully will get some flowers on the spring. And are these ones that you're also just germinating in sphagnum? No, these have to go out to a lab. Okay. Yeah. So when you say a lab, is it like tissue culture kind of thing? Okay. It is. It's very similar, you know, essentially sterile hood, you know, cleaning the seed since it's usually I send out dry seed. Right. Cleaning it with low level bleach, sowing it on agar jelly. They germinate, they get spaced out in the jar and eventually they come back to me. Got it. Yeah. This is the largest species of pleurothallus, which is the same family that the mastivalia and the rostropia are in. And I think we saw a lot of these actually, you had mentioned earlier off camera, but like gardens by the bay, there is actually quite a lot of pleurothallus there. I would believe that. Yeah. It's probably a nice environment for them. And then these, so these are our European terrestrials. So like that hemantaglossum we saw, these are some of the bee orchids from Europe, some orcas and things like that. The bee orchids, are those the ones where the bees like mix all the different types of smells together? Or no? Which ones am I thinking about? I think you're thinking of euglossine bees. Euglossine bees, yeah. Which primarily are South America and they're like pollinating Catlia and Oncidium because the males have little fuzzy patches on their back legs. Right, right. And the guy that smells the best gets the girl. Yeah, exactly. Yes, yeah. Because these are, I don't know what bees, European bees and the flowers mimic either male or female bees or prey sometimes. Oh, fascinating. And what was really cool is they did some research into them and on some of the species, the hairs on the flower were morphologically identical to the hairs on the female bee. Wow, that is so crazy. So like, even though the structure wasn't made of, you know, animal tissue, it was made of plant tissue, the structures were identical. That's insane. Just really neat stuff. That's like plant wisdom there. That's beyond, you know? Yes, absolutely. And these are some Ceterium. This one's gone a little floppy, but this is a genus from South Africa as well. Now, what is this considered? Like, what part, what is this part of the plant? They would be bracts. Bracts. Yeah, essentially. When our curator came, he brought these two plants with him and since then we've been acquiring more species. It's something you almost never see, but it's really neat. It goes dormant in the summer when it's hot. It grows when it's cool in the winter. And the flowers, these, you know, are small and greenish, but the other ones are pink. The Acuminatum smells like honeysuckle and it'll fill the whole greenhouse. Now, I'm just curious because I'm seeing lots of different ways that you're kind of growing and propagating these. Are you using this kind of quartzite kind of sand stuff on the top just so to batten down any of the moss or how does it, or you don't want it to rot or how does that work? These are actually planted in that quartz sand with like a pro mix in there. Yeah. And that's the entire medium. Interesting. Okay. I don't tend to top dress the orchids. Yeah. Mostly because I'm mostly growing epiphytes and the terrestrials that I'm growing, usually it's the same mix straight through. Okay. But no, this mix is basically, I think it's 75% quartz sand and 25% essentially peat moss, you know, non-soil mix kind of thing. Fascinating. And did you come into this career with that being told to you as like the one thing, or did you kind of experiment as you were going? This actually, Peter told me to use. Yeah. Our curator, he brought them to me. You never questioned him. Peter is honestly one of the smartest horticulturalists I've ever met. And he told me for these, he says, that's how, you know, I've grown them before. That's how most people do. I said, done. And obviously it works really well. If they broke, don't fix it. That's exactly right. Other things we have experimented with, you know, the Deesa, I have three different experimental mixes going on right now. Try to find something that's a little bit better. Yeah. And these are more of Peter's plants. And these are, in a lot of cases, hardy orchids. Right. Okay. He's growing to plant outside or they're experimenting with. And are they native orchids, native hardy orchids, or just orchids from everywhere that just happen to work in the zone? It depends. Some of them are natives. I'm not sure about these groups. This may be a mix. I know some of it has been conservation-based, native hardy orchids that were, you know, propagating for conservation sake. Others have been, you know, horticultural. Does this cultivar, does this type grow well here? That sort of thing. Got it. Always nice to see the behind the scenes. Oh, yes. What do you have in here? Ah, yes. This is actually perfect because we were talking about the lab. So these are growth chambers. And this is where all of our orchid seedlings start their life. So these are some of my seedlings. Okay. That our lab sowed. And you can see, there you go. There's a little hobbin area growing along. Yeah. The rest of them have gone dormant. I'm waiting for the next growth cycle to outpot them. Yeah. Fascinating. Yeah. This is where they all come to grow up to be big enough before we can take them out. So there's some things. Some of this group, I potted out a little while ago, and these were the ones that were too small at the time. So we'll wait for them to get bigger before. When they're ready to be potted out, you clean off the gel from the roots and everything like that. Yeah. Some people are very intent on making sure you get off all of the agar because they're worried that it'll, you know, be an opportunity for mold to grow. Right. I personally, if I get most of it off, we're usually good. But also, many of my mixes are rather open. So it'll kind of wash out over time. I don't have to worry as much. So this is the north passage. And you can see the folks down there. That's my team cleaning up the orchids from this morning and preparing the next ones for tomorrow. OK. So are you changing out the orchids every day? Every weekday. Yep. Every weekday. When I started here, there was only one person to help the grower do it, and we did it three days a week. And I was like, this is not sustainable. We can't get anywhere like this. So we've gradually grown our trees, a team. So now, five days a week, we are doing change outs in the display. And it's not the whole thing. No, right. It's like a few here and there. Yeah, it averages maybe 10 to 20 plants a day. OK. And then how many do you have in that room, in general? We have probably between 250 and 300 plants in the room, with the capacity to go up to maybe 500. Interesting. OK. So room to grow. Yeah. So if you like, you can pull the string. Yeah, sure. Why not? That was pretty intense. Exciting. Yeah. And then... Want to come in? Yep. You have to pull it on this side, so it doesn't get you. That'll take your arm off. Yes. So this is our Catlia house. So this is where all, basically, the core of the collection is. All the... This is where we start shedding the clothes, because it's a lot warmer here. Yes, absolutely. 60 to 80 degrees and, you know, bright in here. Balmy, a balmy 80 in here. So this, you know, this is the core of the collection. A lot of these are the oldest plants here. Gosh, a lot, a lot. We have about 5,000 plants in the collection. Wow. Oh, let me turn the fan off. There we go. Now we can hear each other. So some of these are the originals that they had originally at Longwood. Yes. Yep. And so all of our plants, you know, have a brass tag with the name and the accession number. Oh, so fancy. Oh, yeah. First time I'm seeing brass tags. Oh, yes. Antiqued brass, nonetheless. And if you look at the brass tag, the first four digits are the year that it came here. Oh, that's cool. 1972. Right. This one's from 1966. Wow. So then we've just started barcoding the collection, too. So now every plant can be tracked as an individual. And then the chip system works by the last four digits of the barcode so that when this plant returns from display, it gets matched up to the exact place it came from because orchids don't, in the wild, they don't change position. Right. So the more in place an orchid can grow, the better growth you can get. And also this way, when I water, the plants that I'm expecting to be on the bench are there. Yeah. And not things that don't belong there or, you know, otherwise. And so we're also, do you know about virus in orchids? Well, I would imagine that the virus in the orchids could cause some really interesting colorations and stuff. Yes. And you have to be careful about what you think is a variegation versus something that's actually infectious. This is very true. Yeah. So we have two main viruses in orchids that we're worried about. And, you know, as you know, once a plant gets a virus, that's the end of the road eventually. Yeah. So what we've done is tested the entire collection now. And then we've segregated them based on if they're virus or not. So plants with red barcodes have virus. I see. And plants with silver barcodes are virus free. But how do you know, though? Is it just a physiological change or a coloration or? What we do is our IPM, our integrated pest management team, has tested every plant. So they take a leaf sample and they use ELISA testing. Yeah. And they use basically an identifier that latches onto the virus. OK. And then it tells that that plant has virus. Huh. Interesting. And then we correlate that result with the barcode. Huh. So we can, you know, scan the barcode and see what virus it has. Right. And so we have segregated. So this bench is all virus free. This bench is all virus. They don't touch. Yes. We keep them separate as we move them up to the display. I see. OK. Eventually. So you still display the ones with the viruses. But you make sure that they're just not touching anything else. Yes. Is it really just the touch of a leaf to a leaf that could do it or? For the two organ viruses we're most worried about, it's basically sap to sap contact. Sap to sap. So you really need, you know, a wound and another wound to touch. Right. They can spread by water. Yeah. But it's difficult. And you actually have to have an insect with like a chewing mouthpiece. Yeah. To spread them. Yeah. Things like aphids or thrips. Right. They don't spread them. Right. Our goal is eventually the collection will be completely virus free. We have so many rare, valuable orchids that have virus. I was going to say, you don't want to toss them. That's right. Especially if they were some of the OGs, you know. That's right. Exactly. So what we'll do is we're working on systematically replacing the ones. Yeah. That we can replace with exact clones from the marketplace that are clean. I see, yeah. In the end. Because you can't even clone them. You can't. Well. Right. You can. So here's new, sort of relatively new information is you can clone an orchid, clean a virus. But it's not as simple as we would like it to be. So essentially you take your meristem tissue. When it's brand new, before you hope the virus has gotten into the meristem. I see, okay. If you can get the meristem before the virus has moved into it. Yeah. You can make virus free clones. And can you test, you test it in the, you literally, or do you have to wait till the meristem like hardens off or something? You have to wait until the plants are all, you know, growing. Yeah, wow. So that's the hard part. 50, 50 shot. Yeah. And you have to wait three to five years until you have enough plant tissue to test. Okay. To find out if it worked. So eventually wind up with a small group of plants that can't be replaced without cloning them clean. Right. And then we'll undergo that process. But of course it's a lot of trial and error and you know, no guarantees. But for these irreplaceable plants, it's totally worth it. So that's something that we're working on too. Exquisite. I mean, it really is exquisite. I did not realize you had so much, but now that I have a better sense that you are switching things, not just you, but Longwood is switching things out so regularly. You kind of have to have an army or an arsenal of stuff in the back. Yes, you do. And really we are almost in a springboard phase. We have a lot of vision for the future. So, I mean, eventually I think I should have all the greenhouses here to fill with orchids, but I mean, that is going to take a lot of time. But, you know, the collection organizationally, we know we want it to grow and improve and we think we can show people so much more of the orchid world. Well, you have to ham up. I think you have to ham up the historical references back to, because Longwood is about that. It's a lot about history too. Absolutely. I'm just helping you along. Yeah, yeah, I'll take any help I can get. Yeah, we are. Ham it up a bit. You know, these are the original ones that they, you know, touched the hands of, you know. And there's over 35,000 species of orchids in the world. There's over 150,000 human-made hybrids. So that's a lot of diversity. Yeah, you need to calculate how much surface area you need in Longwood and you make a proposal. Yes. So, you know, there's a lot of good things happening here. And, you know, realistically Longwood hasn't pursued breeding in the past, at least not in a systematic way. So we're creating our own hybrids now, which means we can bring new things to the marketplace. You know, find the new interesting things that are coming out of ours. You know, you can see seed pods all over the greenhouses for, you know, with different crosses that I'm making and things like that. Okay, I respect it. So this is our intermediate orchid house. Here's your Cycopsis. Is that what it looks like? Yes. Not that big, but yes. And I've never seen a flower like this before, but yes, that is the leaf. There you go. Yeah. Wow. Exquisite. Yes. If mine ever does flower, that's what it looks like. Yeah, yeah. They resent being repotted. Oh, well, I mean, I have mine in a pot of maybe this size. Oh, okay. So it needs a little more weight. Yeah. That's probably what it needs. Yes. I got it, you know, it was about this tiny when I got it. Oh, wow. It was very tiny. And then now it's kind of... Oh, well, it sounds like you're on your way. You think I should repot it or you think I should keep it in that pot? It depends. If it has room to grow, you can leave it there until it needs a little bit more. The sound is... We have misters under the bench. So humidification, especially in a concrete floor greenhouse is always a challenge. And I've seen lots of times when humidification has gone wrong. Misters overhead that they drip on the plants or they always clog or the misters go off. The exhaust fans suck them right out of the greenhouse. So we put ours under the bench. They miss the floor and the humidity rises up. Fascinating. And we are... Our greenhouses are controlled by Argus, which is a computer system that regulates. So it regulates... I've seen that in the other greenhouses. Yeah. It regulates based on the humidity. Humidity drops below 65%. It runs the humidifier once every 45 minutes. I know you're moving us down here, but what is that? That's a Brassia hybrid that's variegated. That's cool. I've not seen a flower yet. Yeah. A lot of things that are that variegated are hard to get flowers on. But it's growing really well. I'm very impressed with it. I don't tend to favor variegated orchids because I tend to grow just aggressively enough that I usually like drive them out of variegation. Oh, I see. Unless it's genetic, which the way this is very good. It makes me wonder if it isn't a genetic mutation. Like a snake plant, like a gold thread or something. It's really that variegated. It's really something. There's a couple of them hiding around. There's a variegated Catlea back there too. Yeah. If it's variegated and it looks ill, then I'm kind of like not into that. Not quite favorable. This is where most of our lady slippers live. Our path collection. Which also, you know, for exquisite flowers, they also have really exquisite leaves as well. Absolutely. Many of them have really beautiful leaves. And some of our oldest plants are lady slippers too. And so, you know, Phalaenopsis. Here we go. There you go. There's your Eseoclades. Yes. And this is Eseoclades crossed with Eulofia. Oh my God. This looks nothing like either. Yeah. Very interesting. Oh yeah. I totally see what you're saying. From here, just like the leaf up. Not this part. Yeah. I totally see what you're saying. Bizarro. It is. I mean, this looks really Eulofia, but. Right. Yeah. See this. I love this. I mean, these look like little rattles, like a snake or whatever. That coloration. Yeah. Oh, I had this at one point and I recently lost it, unfortunately. What is this? This is a Pilexia olivacea. Yeah. Pilexia. Yeah. Really nice little terrestrial. The nice thing about these is they're easy to grow. For a long time. And it just kicked it. It kicked it. It kicked it recently. But it's also because I'm going back and forth and I don't have a really stand. But this was a really interesting orchid. And yeah, like you said, very easy to care for. Yeah. There's an orchid hybridizer, Leon Gleisenstein, who has done tons of hybridizing with the painted leaf orchids. Yeah. And, you know, some of the leaf patterns he's created are absolutely phenomenal. That's where that plant came from. Interesting. These are some Ludicia discolor that we bred here. And then this is the Makotes. Yeah. Makotes petala. I finally flowered one. I've grown it so many times and this was reluctant to flower. This has become a common one, you know, that people love because of the lightning bolt and down here you can see these are more of our of the breeding that we're doing. These are some more seedlings that's come out of our lab. This is actually Alice Dupont, Catlia Alice Dupont, Waldor, which was named for her, obviously. And these are the original plant was virus. And these are virus free clones that were made. There you go. Using that process. The proof just goes to show you. There it is. You could do it. That's an exquisite color to that cream. Isn't that nice? Yeah. And you can see my my tags there. I've set some seed pods on it. Nice. That plant's been used for breeding by other people, too. So I I knew it would be a good good plant to use. Yeah. These almost look like bamboo. Yes. These are Sabralia. Yeah. So the smallest species is down there. It gets about eight inches tall. The tallest species gets about 30 feet tall. Holy cow. Yeah. That's what I said. I said, we definitely need one of those here. And they said, where would you put it? I said, well, in the conservatory somewhere. No problem. But we'll give, you know, lift rides up to the top to see the flowers. Unbelievable. But yes, these are some of, you know, the more intermediate species. This is this one gets big purple flowers. Really nice. But they only last about a day or two. And then they're sequential. So then the next one comes out after it. So you can get flowering for like two weeks. Yeah. But lots of flowers coming out one after the other. I loved it. Thank you so much. Oh, yeah. My pleasure. Exquisite. And like I said, I love seeing the behind the scenes because it's not something that we get to see. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And the vanilla orchid. Yep. Variegated plantifolia. Yeah. Who pollinates these? Who tickles them? Me when they flower. This one self pollinates. So it always. Yes. Wow. This plant's actually from a seedling that appeared in the greenhouse because the seed spread around and it germinated on of its own accord. That's interesting. It is. This is not plantifolia. I just met a fig that did that. It was it becomes self fertile. It doesn't need the little fig box. And I was like, that's fascinating that you could have some of those that are. Yeah. You know, that may do that. There's a number of orchids that self pollinate for one reason or another. What's interesting is why they self pollinate. Some as the flower opens, the pollen brushes its own stigma. So it literally pollinates itself. Other ones just automatically generate seed regardless. So or, you know, and there's even other mechanisms, too. So when you have a plant family that that's that diverse, you're going to have ones that don't necessarily always play by the rules. Absolutely. And then we have a couple that like to make themselves weeds and they show up in the other pots and whatnot. Well, thank you so much. Yeah. Clearly, your joy. Oh, yeah. This family is infectious. And I love that your little story of how you went from one place to the other and you just went right in. So I think a lot of people could resonate with that. Yeah. Thank you so much. Absolutely. My pleasure. What is it? A psychopsis? Oh, yeah. Yeah. All right. Yes. I think it might have been my first orchid, because I went to an orchid show at the Planting Fields Arboretum, and I was like, look, I haven't grown many orchids or whatever. Can we can you suggest one? And that was the one that was suggested. Someone gave you a psychopsis as your first orchid? Yeah. Is that hard? That's totally bizarre. Really? Yeah. It's like not in the list of first things I'd give you. Pattern leaves. And it actually, even some of the, I have it in a tiny little pot, and some of the roots are actually growing back. Climbing up. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. They'll do that sometimes. So that was, that was cool. And then I got into the isocladies. Oh, yes. Very nice. And I think the, see, I like the terrestrial ones. And seeing the isocladies in the wild and what you're talking about are pretty cool. And then I got into, well, did the eulofias just get recalculated into into isocladies? If they did, I don't know. Okay. I don't, well, not that I know of, but they are very closely related. When we go down, if I remember, I have a hybrid between eulofia and isocladies. There's some eulofias in the snake plant garden in Fairchild Garden. Okay. Because I've commented, I said, actually looking at this now, I said, it looks a lot like an isocladies because it was a thin-leaved variety of eulofia partizii. Okay. And somebody in the comments section said, that's funny you just mentioned it because it just got recalibrated as to it as an isocladies. And I was like, wow, that's something I have to look into. And I did look into it because it just released like last week or whatever. Yeah, that's news to me. I trust you enjoyed the tour through Longwoods Orchid House. Give the video a thumbs up and consider tipping and becoming a sustaining member for the channel. And if you want to dive deeper into houseplant care, maintenance, and more, we have a suite of online courses like Houseplant Basics, 125 Houseplant Care Spreadsheet and the Houseplant Masterclass, which you could find on homesteadbrooklyn.com. And as you may have heard, we have a second channel on YouTube called Flock Finger Lakes, which covers outdoor gardening, permaculture, homesteading, the lost arts, and other cool stuff too. So check that out when you have a chance. See you on both channels.