This one I photographed because the striking color drew me to it. As far a I know, it is an unregistered hybrid of Paphiopedilum Joanna Burkhardt x Paphiopedilum bellatulum.
Aside from the good color is has form issues. The petals are hanging down at two different angles. The dorsal is tilted to the right and the top of the pouch is mis-shapened. The petals are rolled at the edges making them almost tubular.
Now in Paph. bellatulum, there have been some really beautiful forms awarded over the last 10-12 years. But I see no evidence of bellatulum here except the color.
Now Joanna Burkhardt has form issues with several of its clones.
So what we ended up with is good eye catching color but the poor form of Joanna Burkhardt took over.
So it just shows you that not every colorful flower is awardable!!

It was pulled for judging though.

Here is another Phragmipedium that I wanted you to see. It did go to the judging table but not to my team. I am unsure as to the outcome.


This is Phragmipedium Autumn Fire. It is a hybrid of Phrag. Eric Young x Phrag. Barbara LeAnn.
Like the Ngoc Diep Le I showed before, here is another Phragmipedium of very good form. It has a nice wide, flat dorsal, wonderfully held petals and a very nice pouch. The pouch is redder than the remainder of the flower and the interior of the pouch is yellow and without spotting.
This flower was about 3 3/4" wide while the Ngoc Diep Le was about 3 3/8" wide. It too was more pinkish, this is more peachy, almost orange!
I hope that this was awarded. But if not, I have two crosses to look for in shows or in vendors booths.

Bill, thanks so much, nice report!
I need to show that gigantic Dendrochilum tenellum to my small plant for inspiration!

I do love the Phrag Autumn Fire too, nice shape and color! Pretty Ngoc Diep too.

(I am glad the photo uploader worked for you! )

Next I have another beautiful looking Slipper. This is Paphiopedilum Assiniboine. It is a hybrid of Paphiopedilum glaucophyllum x Paph. Hellas.


Assiniboine has been awarded a few times before. Most of those awarded clones were decidedly butterscotch in color. But in this case, both the pouch and petals have a definite pink color to them.
This did get pulled by a judge for consideration and it went to the other team. I am not 100% sure both I don't think that it was awarded.
The dorsal in my image does bend a little to the right towards the apex. Dorsal is beautifully veined and nicely colored. Petals are identically colored and have the same little back twist. The pouch is very pretty, pinkish with a clear yellow staminode.
I wish I was on the team and privy to the measurements and discussion.but it is here for all to see. It is pretty and there were three flowers.

Yes. I got advice and direction from Dave and it is working. When I clicked preview, it does take a bit of time. I was getting impatient. But now, I just wait. I do like that progress bar and they seem to download quicker!!

Paph Assiniboine is another pretty one !

This last one that I have from the show is Paphiopedilum Gene Hausermann. It is a cross of Paph. Adam Hausermann x Paph. Vintner's Treasure. If you like vinicolor slippers, this should tickle your fancy.


This stately flower had a gorgeous dorsal, broad flushed dark burgundy with a whitish picotee. Dorsal was veined even darker burgundy. Petals are dark burgundy, especially on the dorsal half.
Pouch was amongst the darkest that the judges had ever seen collectively. Staminode honey gold with a burgundy blush.
This flower was larger then a previous HCC that we could find. We scored it 80, 81 and 82 for an 81 point AM.
Substance was amazingly waxy, very firm and texture was glossy.
Who wouldn't want this in their collections!?!?

Edited to add: the two white spots in the image are highlights from the sun outside.

Now that is a drama queen! No complaints on this one !

Okay, I am back from the Ann Arbor Orchid Society Festival. It was a very nice little show.
I believe I have posted images of this grex before but it is really worth doing it once again. This is Potinara Hawaiian Prominence. It is a hybrid of Rlc. Hisako Akatsuka x C. Wendy's Redstone. It is a hybrid that has achieved an AM flower quality award.


I believe this is the clone 'America' which has the AM award. Yet somehow this was pulled for AOS judging. Now this happens often. It gets entered in a show without the clonal name! And because it is a spectacular looking flower, it draws attention.
When a flower has an AM flower quality award, it is hard to have it upgraded to an FCC. Yet having said that it still finds its way to the judging table. And there is really nothing we can do. Why?? Because let's just say it is an AM of 82 points. It doesn't make much sense to score it 84 or 85 points. It essentially means that it is as good as it is ever going to get. It would need an upgrade of some 8 points to get there. If it was really a good enough flower, it should have attained the FCC at that time.
To do that we need to see a few real improvements. Such as flower with improved size or flower count or perhaps maybe much fuller segments.

Bill, did you take a sniff, this one smells so good!!
I bought that one in bud a couple of weeks ago - I posted mine in this post
https://garden.org/thread/view...
I love it, it is a really nice plant/bloom.

From the show today. The Grand River Orchid Society won the AOS Show trophy.


This is a 25 square foot, 5 tiered exhibit featuring about 40 plants from about 12 different Genera. Bulbophyllum, Oncidium, Anselia, Cymbidium, Grammatophyllum, Phalaenopsis, Cattleya, Miltoniopsis, Epidendrum and Paphiopedilum

Oh yes. It is nicely fragrant!
Oh so striking a flower!!

Next thing I want to show you is a flower that was awarded about 4 weeks ago at the Lansing Orchid Society Show.


The above is Paphiopedilum Fanaticum which is Paph. malipoense x Paph. micranthum. The above flower is much darker then this one that was awarded today.


It is obviously a lighter colored flower. But it has wonderfully clear markings on a balloon like flower. I imagine that it smells like raspberries.
It is a natural hybrid, occurring in nature and I think that in either color, it is very pretty. The tessellated dorsal and petals with the big, pink balloon like lip is beautiful.
Both of these clones come from Sam Tsui at the Orchid Inn. I saw my buddy Sam today and his beautiful wife Jean and Sam is selling his business!! Oh no, not another?!?!?!?
He is already scouting houses in North Dallas and Florida.

This little Dendrobium burst on the orchid scene maybe 10-12 years ago. Well, at least it seemed that way to be. All of a sudden it stared showing up at vendors sales booths.



This above is Dendrobium trantuanii! It has a certainly interesting growth habit. Rather flat pseudobulbs on squatting, thin based growths. The flattened bulbs make me think of Dendrobium sulcatum, at least I think that that is its name. That species has smallish yellow flowers with cherry red in the throat.
The flowers of trantuanii range from light to dark lavender pink, waxy with green deep in the throat.


The throat has yellowish to chartreuse in the central area or base of the lip and bright orange side lobes. It is a flower around 3.5 centimeters wide and it has a kind of a pastel kind of flavor to it.

Bill, the displays are gorgeous!
Neat Paph Fanaticum with its fat pouch!
Years ago I tried my hand on this Den trantuanii. It was pretty in bloom, but not that long-lived in my hands.

I did take a few images of Phragmipediums from the show today. This first one is a mouthful. It is Phrag. Mama Hanh Thi Nguyen. It is a hybrid of Phrag. Wossner Dirndl x Phrag. kovachii.


This was a large flower, possibly close to 5" wide with wide, stout petals that measure close to 2 1/2" vertical, a pouch that is pinched and slightly twisted. Pouch is a cherry red in color just like the dorsal sepal and petals. There is a nice contrasting yellow rim to the pouch and the yellow spills into the interior of the pouch. In looking closely at the center of the pouch it reminded me of a sun with exploding cherry red rays passing through the yellow. The bloom was on a 'husky' plant which is a common trait found in kovachii hybrids. The inflorescence is reasonably compact keeping the flower in proportion with plant itself.

I was on the Cattleya team today and while we looked at a good number of eligible plants, really only three stood out as being worthy of getting the trophy for best Cattleya. It came down to the Hawaiian Prominence that I posted above. We had a nice plant of C. Glorious May which I think most of us are familiar with AND a Brassovola nodosa.
We went with the nodosa!


The image I posted features about 75% of the flowers that were present. It suffered a little bit by being deep in the middle of its display.

Now comes the time to introduce something that most of you probably have never heard of. I myself have participated in this award perhaps only two or three other times in my 27 year judging career. It is called the AQ award, the Award Of Quality.


What is the Award Of Quality? It is an award the goes to the owner, maybe hybridizer of a collection of 12 plants, either species or hybrids. One of the 12 must have been granted an Award of Quality.
Today we had a group of an uncommon species/variety of a Paphiopedilum. These are Paphiopedilum appletonianum var. hainanense.




Our group of plants under consideration was 13 in number with 16 flowers and one bud. So that condition of a group of 12 was met.
Next condition. One of the twelve needed to have a flower quality award. This last image is of one plant the was granted an HCC of 77 points. So that means that this group under consideration met condition #2.


Notice the spatula shaped, rose tipped petals with a nice green dorsal. Notice the good color, somewhat darker and richer colored then a typical appletonianum.


This second individual plant above was not awarded but it is representative of the members of the group with more triangular shaped petals but still having the rich, darker colors of the typical flower of this group.
So now I am hoping that I have now exposed you all to the anatomy of the AQ award.

New this morning. In looking over this post, I realized that I was able to maneuver these two images of individual flowers on to my computer screen, so I could view them together. You can easily compare the two and see for yourselves which is the better flower.

I want to finish up with my postings from yesterday's Ann Arbor Orchid Festival.
This hybrid of Phrag. Peruvian Royalty was just a commanding plant within a smallish table top exhibit.


The plant had a very tall, gently arching inflorescence. There was one open flower with a second opening bud. The flower was almost 14 centimeters wide. The color of the flower was kind of a salmon pink. I did take this image from the exhibit floor and later on, it was pulled for AOS judging. I have no idea as to the outcome.
But here is what I can add. This is Not a hybrid for me to consider purchasing! It was just a MONSTER of a plant due to the Phragmipedium kovachii parent.
It is Phrag. Bel Royal x Phragmipedium kovachii. It is pretty enough but it also takes up a lot of room in the growing area! The pouch was darker salmon color with a creamy butter yellow inner pouch with red spotting. It is a nice color combination but not really a vibrant, eye catching flower.

Bill, I am reading this through a couple of times.
We are learning a lot here!! Interesting is the group of 12/AQ award, totally new to me! I had no idea of the complexity.

Thanks Bill!!