Dendrobium scabrilingue

It's been another warm winter in Alaska.  February is usually the coldest month, so we could get another cold snap, but the day length is significantly longer now!  It used to be pitch black by the time when we pick up our son at the kindergarten on the way home, but it's not dark any more!  It is a great time to be in Alaska.

Many orchids have been blooming.  But it's been a busy semester, so I haven't had enough time to edit photos and make blog posts.  When I have a little bit of time and energy, I'd like to set the priority straigh, and I would rather play seriously with my son, Taiga, who will be growing up too fast.  Speaking of growing up, I started to play chess with Taiga.  He started to show a strong interest in Chess (and all kinds of board and card games).  I grew up with Shogi, a Japanese Chess, so I'm not too familiar with chess, so we are learning it together.  I started to read a classic chess book, "Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess."  Just in case, he might need a worthy in-house opponent in the future!  This new hobby did bring back my good memory of playing shogi with my grand father and father.  I think my grandfather let me win occasionally (especially when he was drunk), but I don't remember if I ever won over my father even with lots of handycap! Well, my father was playing in a shogi club, and he was a pretty strong player (from what I heard).  But I have a hunch that I can't use the same strategy with Taiga, who can't stand being defeated (we need to work on it, but it can be later).  Today, he managed to capture all of mine except the king and he had the queen and rook.  My king kept escaping around, and it was fun to watch him trying to capture the king. Instead of teaching him how to kill my king quickly, it is probably better for him to struggle and figure out by himself.  Anyway, we'll see how long he will keep his interests in chess.

A couple other fun things we have been doing.

At Tanana Lakes.  It was crazy warm (-6C, 21F) in Jan. 14, so we didn't even have to set-up the tent.  We caught 2 rainbows.

The starting event of Yukon Quest 2018.  It was -26C (-15F), which is more normal temperature for February 3.

At Ascension Rock Club.  Diana and I got a fair amount of work out, but Taiga didn't have a problem.

Going back to the orchid, I got this plant from Seattle Orchids when they had scratch-and-dent sale in September 2016.  I've heard that this species could be a little touchy, but it's been doing OK so far, and the newest cane looks better.  Wood (2006) mentioned that his imports  didn't make roots, and gradually declined, but one plant could last for 5 years.  I also noticed that this plant seems to be fairly root-shy (roots are short), and I do still worry about it.  Although Wood (2006) mentioned flowers with slightly rotten odor, I would consider it to be one of the best fragrant orchids in my collection.  My observation matches with Schelpe and Stewart (1990), who considered it to be delightfully fragrant.  The fragrance is difficult to describe, but makes me think of spring, and it is pleasant and floral fragrance.  Even though my nose isn't too good, I can detect immediately when I open the grow tent, and it isn't overwhelmingly strong.

This species of Section Formosae is from the northern parts of Myanmar, Thailand and Laos, around 1500m (Wood, 2006).  He mentioned that the species epithet, scabrilingue, means "rough tongue", which can be seen in the photo of the lip.  It is a fairly compact species, the stem (cane) is about 20cm so far.  I've been growing in cool end of intermediate; max/min daily temperature of 29/18C (84/65F) in the summer and 21/13C (70/55F) in the winter.





Literature cited:

• Schelpe, S. and J. Stewart.  1990. Dendrobiums: an Introduction to the Species in Cultivation.  Orchid Sundries, Stour Provost, Dorst, England.
• Wood, H. P. 2006. The Dendrobiums. A.R.G. Gantner Verlag K.G., Ruggell, Liechtenstein.