Bring on the orchids
TRAVERSE CITY -- On my last trip to East Lansing, on the banks of the Red Cedar, I paid visit to the annual orchid show in the Plant and Soil Sciences building on Michigan State University campus. Basically, the warm up late this winter got me just plain too excited for spring native orchids. That's why I met up with my plant nerd friends and went to the show. Some people think it's weird for a 25-year-old man, two years out of college, to be so interested in plants, but to them I say, "Enjoy having an ugly yard (or in the case of 7&4 News, an ugly desk area)."
Walking around the show I saw dozens of orchids I would have loved to bring home with me, but I ended up two. A Paphiopedilum delenatii, which looks surprisingly similar to our native Cypripedium reginae or Showy Lady's Slipper -- and an oncidium/odontoglossom cross, Burrageara Stephen Isler. Both are pretty spectacular in their own right, but the cross really seems to hold its flowers for a long time. It's been going for well over a month now and the first blooms are only now just fading. There are still two left to open and I just spotted another spike shooting today!
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