Cattleya Orchid

Cattleya Orchid

(KAT-lee-yuh)

This is an old shot of a Cattleya Orchid with some nice lighting. It was shot with my 5MP compact camera. The file size is a joke compared to the newer cameras but at least it didn’t have to be crushed down to fit here. Cattleyas are some of my favorite types of Orchids and they always seem to enchant me with the big flowers and heavenly fragrance.

Short post here today because we are having massive thunderstorms this morning and I only turned on my computer to post this.

Blue Globe Thistle

Blue Globe Thistle
Echinops ritro
(EK-in-ops) (RIH-tro)

Since this plant was blooming at work but I didn’t have my camera I decided to reach into the archives for this macro of the flower. It was taken July 25, 2005 with my Nikon Coolpix 5400. The camera is still kicking around all though I haven’t used it in quite a while. The fact that it had an articulating viewing screen was helpful and a lot of fun. In general it is a good camera that has the ability to be set up fully manual if you want.

The Blue Globe Thistle has turned into a nice patch of flowers in a tough area. It does kind of have a unique appearance and since it is tall might be nice to have in the back of the border but it certainly can stand on its own also. One nice thing is it appears to be deer proof and the other animals don’t seem to like it either. It is easy to maintain only requiring deadheading after flowering and the cleaning of the foliage in the spring.

Pink Canna Lily

Canna Lily
Canna x generalis
(KAN-uh) (jen-er-RAY-liss)


Here is a nice pink Canna lily for Saturday. By the looks of it this cultivar is ‘China Doll’ but that isn’t 100% sure. It is really windy outside to today so I am inside working on the new website. I have worked up enough courage to post a preview link in the comments section. It should be broken once the hosting at my present website is switched to the new one in a couple of weeks. Let me know what you think.

This picture was shot with my Coolpix 5400, which is a 5 megapixel point and shoot (although it does have full manual mode) camera.

Black and White Orchids

Black and White Orchids

Yesterday I attended the New York Orchid Show again. The flowers were still fresh and I saw a couple of Orchids that either I missed last time or were new. I took both of my Point and Shoot cameras (or compact cameras as I like to call them) with me to try and shoot a couple of Black and White images. I call them compact cameras since they are capable of running on full manual settings, if you want. I can never believe all the technology that is packed into these little boxes. I think that Orchids are detailed enough to give some interest to a black and white photo and once the magnificent color is stripped away you are down to the shape of the flower.


I didn’t get the names of these orchids on purpose, although you may see color versions of the same flower in a later post. These are not conversions from color. They are shot in the ‘monochrome’ setting on the camera. I think the camera seems to take a better picture when it is set to black and white then the conversions. I used both my Nikon Coolpix 5400 and 8400 for these pictures.


I am going to keep it short since it is a holiday. Happy Easter to all that are celebrating. Since I spent a lot of time at the Orchid Show I didn’t get to walk around the NYBG grounds yesterday. I had to go straight from the show to my appointments. I got a couple of pruning jobs. One is going to take about a week. That is a lot of cutting.

Calanthe Orchids

Calanthe Orchid
(kal-AN-thee)

The Orchid collection at Planting Fields was beautiful and bountiful. There were some that I hadn’t seen before and some common ones. These two Calanthe Orchids were really out in force and I couldn’t help snapping a few photos as I strolled by. The first two pictures are Calanthe ‘William Murray’. I didn’t find much reference material on this cultivar but did find out that the genus Calanthe has about 200 species, most of which are native to Asia. The 200 species includes both evergreen and deciduous plants. That is a new one on me, as I didn’t know there were any deciduous Orchids.

Calanthe ‘William Murray’

Here is a link to the best article I found. It includes some history and detailed repotting instructions:
merkles orchids.com

This plant’s tag said Calanthe ‘rosea’

On Friday I decided to get out my Nikon Coolpix 5400 and maybe use it over the weekend. When I turned it on the Auto focus light was blinking and the monitor was black. It would snap a picture with the flash and all the controls seem to work but no pictures. I searched for problems with the 5400 and found my camera had the dreaded BGLOD (Blinking Green Light of Death). I found a service advisory on Nikon USA saying to send it into them and they will fix it for free. I am going to package it up today or tomorrow and see what happens. This is the first serious technical issue I have had with a Nikon camera ( and I have several) that wasn’t self induced. This is fairly amazing when you consider what my equipment goes through. I am interested to see how the customer service is on this issue and will post the results.