Safety In Numbers

This post is mostly about contamination, but I figured I had better start out with a picture of a beautiful orchid, lest I scare away any readers:

LaelioCattleya Frank Shadle
©2012 MadOrchidist.com

This is LC Franks Shadle, happily blooming away in (what I consider) frigid conditions outside right now (I am pretty sure it hit freezing last night).  This kind of temperature tolerance should definitely be selected for, and I have already pollinated the flower (as if there would be any question).

Anyway, on to the real issue at hand.  A little while ago, I had a marathon session in the glovebox flasking up some seeds I ordered on eBay.  I opted to make two flasks of each species as insurance against contamination.

Contaminated Flask
©2012 MadOrchidist.com

It is a cruel irony of orchid culture that if something goes wrong, you will probably find the unpleasant result very quickly, but if something goes right, it may take months (or years) on end to reward you.  Such is the case here.

Ascocentrum and Gastrochilus flasks contaminated
©2012 MadOrchidist.com

Two of the 8 total flasks in this group have grown a white fluffy fungus - one Gastrochilus bellinus and one Ascocentrum ampullaceum.  These are the two in which I was most interested, so I am glad to have a backup flask of each that appears uncontaminated.  Really, the fact that some flasks have turned up contaminated means I can probably breathe easy about those remaining.  After more than 2 weeks, none of this cohort has yet shown any signs of germination, but as with all things orchid, it could take a while . . .

So, having sown seeds in 18 mother flasks thus far in my laboratory career, two of them have grown something rather unpleasant.  That is a contamination rate of about 0.11 -- improvable, but also acceptable to me at this stage.

Of the remaining seed flasks, three Epidendrums have begun growing, and everything else shows no sign of life - either desirable or undesirable.  More waiting.

I have long been growing Orchids for their beautiful flowers, so I understand the waiting game, but there is a trick for the impatient like me.  If you have enough plants, the likelihood that something will be blooming at any given moment increases dramatically.  I remember becoming aware, several years ago, that I had reached this "critical mass" of Orchids.  My off the cuff estimate is that once you reach a couple of hundred different plants (provided they are of a variety of varieties), you can pretty much count on having at least something blooming all the time.

The Mad Orchidist in his natural habitat

I think that the same phenomenon will eventually kick in with my laboratory operation.  Right now, because I have a modest number of flasks and seed pods going, it sometimes seems as if nothing is happening.  If this adventure picks up momentum, which I hope it will, then at some point in the no-so-distant future it will seem that there is always something interesting going on.  Safety, and excitement, in numbers!