I said at the beginning of the month that I was relying on my house plants to help me get through the month. But when a house plant–or more specifically, an orchid–looks like this, you can see why I might be having a few problems with the winter doldrums! The botanical name–and it has many–is cirrhopetalum Elizabeth Ann Buckleberry. It’s a hybrid of several parentages–I won’t bore you with further details.
Here’s the whole plant–not much better. Its redeeming quality is its sweet scent. That’s probably what it uses to attract pollinators.
In nature, each orchid has a specific pollinator–and some of them are quite creepy. They are not the normal bees and flies we think of as pollinators. But that is a subject best left to the orchid experts. Here’s an interesting story about Charles Darwin (yes, that Darwin, of evolution fame) and how it took 150 years to prove his theory about an orchid pollinator correct–in this case a hawk moth.
Let’s just say no one grows orchids to attract pollinators!
