I bought this Phalaenopsis species, along with three others, last fall at a local orchid sale. Three of the four have flowered. This one was supposed to be P. schilleriana but it almost certainly is not. It looks a lot like the P. philippinensis that is also in bloom but the flowers are larger. To those with more experience growing the mottled species, is this just another form of P. philippinensis or a primary hybrid like P. philippinensis x schilleriana?

For reference, here is the P. philippinensis







And the gorgeous P. stuartiana, with its green tinge.

@BigBill @Ursula orchid forum

Chances are the top flower is Phalaenopsis philippinense. It's characteristics are white flowers with a slight pink blush, more prominent on the reverse.
Lip is described as having yellow side lobes with 4 red lines at the base nearest the column.
Phalaenopsis schilleriana has pink flowers anywhere from very light pink to dark pink. It's flowers open sequentially down the inflorescence.
Phalaenopsis philippinense's flowers tend to open all at once!

A trait of stuartiana is the little red spots on the basal portion of the lateral sepals. They can be very green on the reverse side of the sepals.
Good luck! They are all very pretty.

Thank you for the reply!
It does look most similar to Phalaenopsis philippinense. However, it did flower several weeks earlier than the other two and the buds, three in total, definitely did not open all at once. I was excited when it opened since it was much lighter than I expected, and I am not a huge fan of pink. The Phalaenopsis philippinense buds, five in total, opened last and pretty much all at once. It was not until I compared the two that I realized how similar they were.

The reason I ask is that I am attempting to cross them to each other and one definitely does not match its label.

Well let me say this, it takes a lot of Botanical differences to create or name a new species.
Size of flower is not one of them. It can be easily influenced by both good and bad culture.
Since the research I did of philippinense indicated that flower count for that species is often 20-25. That's when it said that they typically open all at once. If yours has either three or five flowers on it, then that feature is hard to compare directly since yours are under flowered. It is not that they couldn't be a different species but it probably is culture related.
If something blooms a few weeks early or late doesn't mean anything either. I have Guarianthae bowringiana for example, it blooms for me in October. But every once in a while more flowers open in November, or I had one starting to open in mid September. This does not produce a valid reason for a new species.
Now if I had a bowringiana that blooms in early August or in mid January, that might be noteworthy.
You could always ship off pickled flowers to an orchid taxonomist to make sure but that costs money. But that is an option that you have.

One other wildcard that you have with species is geographical differences. For example, plants from lower altitudes of Cattleya maxima bloom a certain way, say fewer flowers but bigger flowers, say 3-5!
Now the uplands form of Cattleya maxima bloom with 9-15 flowers per inflorescence. They are typically 25% smaller and typically paler. But they are geographical varieties, NOT different species. These upland varieties are also smaller vegetatively by 25-40%.
Good luck! They are beautiful regardless.

@BigBill Okay, thank you for the thorough reply!
It probably just got mistagged - all of these came from the same vendor and mottled leaf species probably look very similar when not in spike. I read online that schilleriana tends to have bigger flowers when there are fewer of them - that probably explains part of the size difference here too. If they were seedlings of an outcross, as I suspect they were, that too would explain the slight differences between them.
Still need a schilleriana it seems, and a replacement lindenii. The celebensis did not flower this year, but has the most amazing foliage of all four plants.

Your welcome.

There is a hybrid and it has a name. It is Phalaenopsis Philisander! It is a hybrid of Phalaenopsis philippinense X Phalaenopsis sanderiana.
Flowers are very wide ranging in the amount of pink. Some have a slight pink blush. Some are more pink, medium pink blushed and some are almost completely pink.

I am looking for a hybrid of philippinense X schilleriana.

Well I have to be honest, the more I look into this group of Phalaenopsis from the Philippines, the more unsure I become!
They are just so similar that you really need a taxonomist!
P. sanderiana
P. schilleriana
P. philippinense
P. amabilis
P. stuartiana
P. aphrodite
They are just so close, I wouldn't begin to swear on any of these being anything without a complete botanical description in front of me. Just when I think I have a handle on identifying something, that changes. I take back all that I said before! I apologize because I have no idea which end is up any more.
Olga, if you have tags identifying one plant is one thing and another plant is another species, you can certainly believe what the tag says. My minor in college was botany and I am some what familiar with plant taxonomy terms and I can still find my way around a plant identification key, BUT without the material in front of me, I can't say anything with certainty in this format.
I would need a reliable plant key of native Phalaenopsis and have specimens in front of me, a hand lens in hand, and maybe I could figure out some of these. But here, on these pages, I can't say anything for sure!
Sorry.

@BigBill No worries! The key distinguisher of Phalaenopsis philippinense seems to be the yellow side lobes - none of the other mottled foliage species share that characteristic. That is not to say it is not a primary hybrid between two of them - philippinense X schilleriana (aka Philishill) seems to be the most common and the most likely.
http://www.phals.net/philippin... (the philippinensis x mariae is amazing!!!)

There is a lot of regional and even local variability within species. I can ask the vendor next time I see him what the source of his material was and if he carries Philishill.

In any case, love the mottled foliage! I hope to create offspring that maintain the mottling but have new and unique flowers. I just need to figure out how best to germinate them...

Although I do not currently grow Phalaenopsis, I have always admired those who do. We all have likes and dislikes. I am very partial to this entire group not only for the flowers but for the foliage which is a huge bonus.
I am also partial to violacea and bellina!!
So glad to have made your acquaintance! Good luck again in your pursuits!!

Cross referencing to another post for the actual seedpods: https://garden.org/thread/view...
9 out of 12 crosses took. Interestingly, the stuartiana was the pollen source for the 3 crosses that did not take (so only 1 out of 4 stuartiana crosses took).

I just found a flower stalk on the Phal. celebensis! I have been told the flowers are tiny but the leaves are amazing!

What to cross the flowers to though... Perhaps my local orchid society members would swap pollen.

I also ordered some more species for future crosses - Phal. mariae, sanderiana (spotted leaves as well with purple tint), sumatrana (with scalloped leaves) and a replacement lindenii.