I recently got this plant from Bela Vista Orchids of Brazil (so I can't take the credit of blooming it) as Cattleya blumenscheinii. But it doesn't quite look like the other photos of this species. Can anyone comment on the identification? I'm still learning about this group, and it is pretty difficult to gather taxonomic information. I think there are some natural hybridization/introgression, too, which makes taxonomy more difficult.
Cattleya blumenscheinii is named in honor of Almiro Blumenschein, who was an executive director of Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA: Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuaria). From what I have read, this species grows in highly exposed rocky cliff around 1200m elevation in the state of Espirito Santo and Minas Gerais, Brazil. There aren't so many info about this species, and mine looks somewhat different from the photos I have found (e.g. SOF and IOSPE). The color balance of my photos is very slightly shifted toward less yellow, but the real flower color still seems to be paler than other photos on internet. Also the tip of the lip mid-lobe is pinkish while other photos don't seem to have the pronounced pink. It is interesting to hear that other plants of BV Orchids has this pinkish lip.
My Brazilian friend with good knowledge of Brazilian orchids told me that the inflorescence shape is also different. The typical C. blumenscheinii has clustered flowers near the tip of the long inflorescence. According to the description in "The Cattleyas and Their Relatives, Vol 2: Laelia" by Withner, the inflorescence is 38cm or longer, carrying 5-12 flowers, and the pseudobulb is 12-15cm tall with a 17cm leaves on top of it. The photo below is not a good picture with the blown high-light..., but it tells the current size of the plant (it's in 2" Rand's Aircone pot). The stem length of the inflorescence was only 15-20cm. My plant is still small and it is still stressed from the importation, too. So we'll see if the flower color and the inflorescence length/shape changes next year. But it is likely a different species or the result of hybridization/introgression. It looks like that I might need to self-fertilize to see the segregation in the offspring in the future.
I haven't had enough time to know about its culture, but I'm treating it in the same way as the other 20 or so rupicolous Cattleya (Laelia) which I have. Potting media: larva rocks at the bottom, 5mm of sphagnum moss, the main media is smaller larva rocks:sphagnum moss=1:1. Intermediate temperature.
As a side note, this species is included in the ITS-based molecular phylogeny in the following paper (not much resolution within section Parviflorae, though):
van den Berg, C., W.E. Higgins, R.L. Dressler, W.M. Whitens, M.A. Soto Arenas, A. Fulham, and M.W. Chase. 2000. A Phylogenetic analysis of Laeliinae (Orchidaceae) based on sequence data from Internal Transcribed Spacers (ITS) of nuclear ribosomal DNA. Lindleyana 15(2): 96–114
BV Orchids visits the US once a year for Redland International Orchid Festival, and bring lots of cool Brazilian orchids. They will ship the pre-ordered plants within the US after they import them into Florida. So the buyers don't need an import permit. Acclimation of the imported plants are slightly trickier, but their plants were all in very good conditions. I've been pre-ordering plants from abroad, and communication through English which isn't vendor's native language could be a bit rough. But the communication with BV orchids is the top notch, and the owner himself gave me lots of helpful information via email. There are a couple species named in honor of the owner of BV Orchids (e.g. Cycnoches schmidtianum, Epidendrum schmidtianum etc.). Anyway, I highly recommend them if you are into Brazilian orchids.
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