Cumann Magairlíní na hÉireann

Volume 16, Issue One

THE IRISH ORCHID SOCIETY
OFFICERS & COMMITTEE
Brendan Sayers (Chairperson) ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION
Mary Bradshaw (Treasurer) [Renewable in June of each year]
Carmel Higgins (Secretary) Adult Single €20.00
Laurence T. May (Editor) Family €30.00
OAP/Student* €15.00
Committee:
*Confirmation of student status required
Marina Andreeva
Lisa Coffey Please make cheques or PO payable to: The Secretary, Irish Orchid Society
Aleksandra Kucharczyk Payments may be made by Credit Card and by PayPal on our website. Members
Laurence T. May and friends may also donate in support of the Society’s educational activities and
Pollinia. Please contact the Editor for information on advertising.

POLLINIA Applications, questions about membership and other Society communications

(pol-LIN-ee-uh)
The compact packets of pollen found in orchid
flowers. The plural of Pollinium.
Waxy pollen clumps or grains usually found in
the anthers of most orchids; often yellow,
distinct, and found under the pollen cap of the
column.
Pollinia contain the male reproductive cells.
Latin pollin-, stem of pollen "fine flour, dust."
should be made to:
Hon. Secretary
The Irish Orchid Society
c/o National Botanic Gardens
Botanic Road, Dublin, D09 E7F2, Ireland
The Editorial Staff reserve the right to edit and/or amend articles submitted to
the Newsletter.
The views or comments published within this Newsletter are not necessarily
views shared by either the Editorial Staff or the Irish Orchid Society.
Copyright © 2005-2018

Contributions of articles, photos or comments may be sent by email to:

The Editor - ios.pollinia@gmail.com
or by post to:

Laurence T. May, Bellarush,

Castlebaldwin, via Boyle, F52 DV79
Co. Roscommon, Ireland

Copies of this and previous issues (in pdf format) are available at:
Orchid Pollinia
www.pollinia.org

Copyrights for the photographers’ and artists’

images belong to their respective owners.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 2 ]

IOS & OTHER ORCHID EVENTS, FAIRS, MAY
MEMBERS’ NIGHT
MEETINGS, SHOWS, CONFERENCES 7 Monday May 7th, 2018, 7:30pm
2018 Bring along your orchids for discussion. We can
discuss the Orchid Fair and the plants purchased.

JUN
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING 2018
11 Monday June 11th, 7:30pm
2018 The traditional state of the Society address will be
All talks are held in the Visitors Centre of the National Botanic given with the Committee putting forward ideas to
Gardens, Glasnevin, and begin at 7:30pm, unless otherwise advance the society in the year ahead. It is also the
stated. Please check the IOS website for possible changes. forum for members to give their feedback and
suggestions.
FEB MEMBERS’ NIGHT
5 Monday February 5th, 2018, 7:30pm
Bring along your orchids for discussion, whether
JUN ANNUAL NORTH BULL ISLAND WALK
21
2018
you have problems with them, need advice, or Thursday, June 21st, 2018, 6:30pm
simply just want to show them off. 2018 Join Ireland's orchid expert Brendan Sayers and
discover some of Ireland's wild orchids in the sand
MAR MEMBERS’ NIGHT dunes of Bull Island in Dublin. Be prepared for
good or bad weather!
5 Monday March 5th, 2018, 7:30pm
2018 Bring along your orchids for discussion, whether Meet at the Interpretive Centre. All welcome. Walk
you have problems with them, need advice or will be about 1.5 hours.
simply just want to show them off.
APR DUBLIN ORCHID FAIR 2018
Saturday April 21st & Sunday 22nd
21-22 Opening hours: 10am – 5pm, Admission free
2018
The annual orchid fair organised by the National
Botanic Gardens is to be held this weekend in the
conservatory at the gardens in Glasnevin. This is the
premier annual orchid event in Ireland with a large
selection of species and hybrids for sale.

On Saturday the Royal Horticultural Society's

Orchid Committee will sit and judge plants in the
Meeting Room at the rear of the Curvilinear Range.
The Gallery in the Visitor Centre will hold an
exhibition of paintings by Margareta Pertl and
Deborah Lambkin along with some material from
the archives in the National Botanic Gardens,
Library. This is an exciting weekend for both orchid
lovers and gardeners alike. There will be plenty to
see and do so please come and enjoy.
European Orchid Conference and Exhibition

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [3 ]

FROM THE EDITOR - LAURENCE MAY
As members will not receive this issue until January, after the holidays, I hope everyone had a happy Christmas and look
forward to an enjoyable and prosperous 2018 full of orchids. I plan on attending the European Orchid Conference and
Exhibition in Paris in March and will report in a subsequent issue of Pollinia.

Should you be looking for suitable gifts for family or friends who are interested in orchids, or plants in general, a year’s renewal
extension or new membership to the Irish Orchid Society is the ideal present (and also for anniversaries, birthdays, etc.)
Please use the Membership page on our website (http://irishorchidsociety.org/membership.php), and pay through PayPal, or contact
the Secretary directly to ensure your gift will be arranged in time. E-mail: info@irishorchidsociety.org

I received a gift book about a bird for Christmas (no, not a turkey.) It turned out to be fascinating and one of the best books I’ve read
in a long time. I recommend it to all who appreciate a well-written, informative and rewarding story. See the bottom of page 28.

MEMBERS SUBSCRIPTION REMINDER Members are reminded that the Membership year begins on June 1st each year.
Annual Subscriptions will be due for 2018-2019. Subscription payments per the schedule on page two are to be posted to: Secretary,
The Irish Orchid Society c/o National Botanic Gardens, Dublin, D09 E7F2. If you prefer, you may use the Credit Card/PayPal form
at our website: www.irishorchidsociety.org/membership.php

Our thanks to Philippa Thomas and many others for sending photos
of their flowering plants and for their general good wishes.

And our congratulations to Marina Andreeva on the birth of her

daughter Mila Maxwell Andreeva, August 19th

Should your cat go missing, be sure to look everywhere!

Front Cover
Masdevallia richardsoniana, genus Masdevallia, first described by Carlyle Luer (1988.) Found in Peru as a caespitose,
mini-miniature sized, cool growing epiphyte in moderately cool, wet, montane forests at elevations around 1800 meters.
Flower Size: 2cm [3/4"]. Also named Alaticaulia richardsoniana (Luer)

Rear Cover
The amazing variety of orchid seeds. Joseph Georg Beer: Beitraege zur Morphologie und Biologie der Familie der
Orchideen. (1863). A key to seed identification may be found at www.pollinia.org/seeds/

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 4 ]

 M onica Gagliano began to study plant behavior because she was tired of killing
animals. Now an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Western Australia
in Perth, when she was a student and postdoc, she had been offing her
research subjects at the end of experiments, the standard protocol for many animals
studies. If she was to work on plants, she could just sample a leaf or a piece of root.
When she switched her professional allegiance to plants, though, she brought with her
some ideas from the animal world and soon began exploring questions few plant
specialists probe—the possibilities of plant behavior, learning, and memory.

“You start a project, and as you open up the box there are lots of other questions inside
it, so then you follow the trail,” Gagliano says. “Sometimes if you track the trail, you
end up in places like Pavlovian plants.”

In her first experiments with plant learning, Gagliano decided to test her new subjects
the same way she would animals. She started with habituation, the simplest form of
THE HIDDEN learning. If the plants encountered the same innocuous stimulus over and over again,
would their response to it change?
MEMORIES OF
PLANTS At the center of the experiment was the plant Mimosa pudica, which has a dramatic
response to unfamiliar mechanical stimuli: Its leaves fold closed, perhaps to scare away
eager herbivores. Using a specially designed rail, Gagliano introduced her M. pudica to
a new experience. She dropped them, as if they were on a thrill ride in an amusement
park for plants. The mimosa plants reacted. Their leaves shut tight. But as Gagliano
Inside a quiet repeated the stimulus—seven sets of 60 drops each, all in one day—the plants’ response
revolution changed. Soon, when they were dropped, they didn’t react at all. It wasn’t that they
were worn out: When she shook them, they still shut their leaves tight. It was as if they
in the study of the knew that being dropped was nothing to freak out about.
world’s other great
kingdom. Three days later, Gagliano came back to the lab and tested the same plants again. Down
they went, and … nothing. The plants were just as stoic as before.

This was a surprise. In studies of animals such as bees, a memory that sticks for 24
hours is considered long-term. Gagliano wasn’t expecting the plants to keep hold of the
training days later. “Then I went back six days later, and did it again, thinking surely
now they forgot,” she says. “Instead, they remembered, exactly as if they had just
received the training.”

She waited a month and dropped them again. Their leaves stayed open. According to
the rules that scientists routinely apply to animals, the mimosa plants had demonstrated
that they could learn.

In the study of the plant kingdom, a slow revolution is underway. Scientists are
beginning to understand that plants have abilities, previously unnoticed and
unimagined, that we’ve only ever associated with animals. In their own ways, plants can
see, smell, feel, hear, and know where they are in the world. One recent study found that
clusters of cells in plant embryos act a lot like brain cells and help the embryo to decide
when to start growing.

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [5 ]

 Mimosa pudica, with its leaves open

Of the possible plant talents that have

gone under-recognized, memory is one of
the most intriguing. Some plants live their
whole lives in one season, while others
grow for hundreds of years. Either way, it
has not been obvious to us that any of
them hold on to past events in ways that
change how they react to new challenges.
But biologists have shown that certain
plants in certain situations can store
information about their experiences and
use that information to guide how they
grow, develop, or behave. Functionally, at
least, they appear to be creating memories.
How, when, and why they form these
memories might help scientists train plants
to face the challenges—poor soil, drought,
extreme heat—that are happening with
increasing frequency and intensity. But
first they have to understand: What does a
plant remember? What is better to forget?

Scientists have shied away from studying what might be called plant cognition in part because of its association with pseudoscience,
like the popular 1973 book The Secret Life of Plants. Certain types of plant memories were mixed up, too, with discredited theories
of evolution. One of the most well-understood forms of plant memory, for example, is vernalisation in which plants retain an
impression of a long period of cold, which helps them determine the right time to produce flowers. These plants grow tall through
the fall, brace themselves during winter, and bloom in the longer days of spring—but only if they have a memory of having gone
through that winter. This poetic idea is closely associated with Trofim Lysenko, one of the Soviet Union’s most infamous scientists.

Lysenko discovered early in his career that by chilling seeds he could turn winter varieties of grains, normally planted in the fall and
harvested in the spring, into spring varieties, planted and harvested in the same growing season. He was, in essence, implant ing a
false memory of winter in plants that need a cold signal to grow. Despite this insight, Lysenko was not a very good scientist. But
after he published early work on vernalisation in the late 1920s, the Soviet government, looking for an agricultural panacea,
inundated him with money and prestige. As Lysenko gained power, he made outrageous claims about his original idea.
Vernalisation, he said, could transform all kinds of plants, including potatoes and cotton, and boost the bounty of Soviet lands.

The evidence for these claims was scant, but that didn’t matter. By 1936, Lysenko led a major research institute and was a member
of the Central Executive Committee, the nexus of Soviet power. With the help of a government-appointed philosopher, Lysenko
developed a theory of his work that mixed Marxism with the discredited ideas of French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. The
offspring of vernalized plants, he argued, could inherit that acquired characteristic, so that by changing their environment he could
create new breeds of staple crops in a fraction of the time of traditional breeding techniques—just as, by changing the environment
of the working class, communism could create a new breed of men.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 6 ]

“All the claims were based on a principle of malleability, that genes were not all that important,” says Loren Graham, an emeritus
historian at Harvard who has tracked Lysenko’s career. “Lysenko was a little unclear on the existence of genes.”

In practice, Lysenko’s theory fell apart. He couldn’t breed new varieties of grains that inherited memories of winter. He had
promised fields fuller than ever before, but his ideas couldn’t save the country from famine in 1946 and 1947. And when geneticists
challenged his ideas, Lysenko denounced them, which led to imprisonment and death for hundreds of scientists. He is often said to
be responsible for creating a missing generation of
Russian geneticists, who either gave up their work,
left the country, or were punished for going against
him. Without them, Lysenko never could see where
he was right (plants could form these memories of
winter) and where he had gone wrong (this type of
memory, at least, cannot be transmitted across
generations). It took a generation of scientists,
working in the West, to uncover the true secrets of
the phenomenon Lysenko claimed as his own but
never truly understood.

E ven as Lysenko was making his grandiose

claims, scientists on the other side of the Iron
Curtain were trying to understand how
vernalization works. Some of the most important
investigations to examine this mystery took place in
Tübingen, Germany, in the lab of Georg Melchers
and Anton Lang. Melchers was a leading biologist of
plant development, and Lang was a stateless, refugee
Russian biologist. Together they studied
vernalisation in search of the biochemical secret of
flowering, a hypothetical plant hormone scientists
called “florigen.”

One of their study subjects was a nightshade called

A non-vernalized plant (left) and a vernalized one (right)
henbane, Hyoscyamus niger. Some plants flower
after reaching a certain point in their development,
like teenagers who hit puberty and start to parade
their newfound sexuality immediately, regardless of
the consequences. Other plants, though, behave more
like teenagers who wait for summer break to go
crazy: They only flower when they receive cues from
their environment that it’s the ideal time to do so.
Henbane is one of the latter and requires both a
period of cold and the right light to bloom. Rather
than growing and dying in one season, as annual
plants do, certain varieties of henbane are biennials,
with a life cycle that spans two growing seasons. In
their first spring and summer, these plants grow as
much as they can, but hold back from flowering.

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [7 ]

Only in the following spring do they burst into bloom—creamy white flowers smudged in their centers with red-wine purple that
runs through the veins on their petals. For a biennial, these dual requirements make sense: They prevent the plant from flowering in
the fall, when the light is right but the cold days of winter would doom their flowers.

Hyoscyamus niger, or henbane

While trying to understand how vernalization and

day length work in concert to make henbane flower,
Melchers and Lang probed the limits of the plant’s
memory of winter. In one experiment, they
vernalized the plants by chilling them in a fridge
and then tried to reverse the process by blasting
them with warmth. The plants, they found, formed
lasting impressions of the cold relatively quickly.
After a day or two of chilling, the scientists could
still “de-vernalize” the plants, but after four days,
that possibility had vanished—the plants remained
vernalized. In practice, this means that a warm spell
in February won’t trick henbane into forgetting the
cold weeks they have experienced. In another
experiment, they withheld the ideal day length. The
vernalized plants continued to grow but never
flowered. Even after 10 months, when they were
exposed to the day length that told them it was the
right time, they would still bloom. They had
remembered that experience of cold for close to a
year.

Melchers and Lang didn’t describe vernalisation as a “plant memory,” but today it’s one of the most studied examples. Their
experiments showed that plants could hold on to their pasts, for much longer than a person might expect, like undercover agents,
fully trained but awaiting the signal to act.

When most people look at a plant, it’s hard to imagine that it’s waiting for anything. Plants don’t seem to have long-term plans. If
they lack water, they droop. If it rains, they perk up. If they sense sunlight, they grow toward it. To our human way of thinking, it
doesn’t seem like plants are doing very much at all. But we don’t recognize memories in people or dogs just by looking at them, but
rather by their behavior. The dog comes when called by name; the person smiles in recognition. For the mimosa or henbane plants,
something from the past changed how they reacted in the future—even if we don’t notice or understand why.

Scientists first started talking about “plant memory” explicitly in the 1980s. A team in France, for example, happened upon a type of
memory in which a plant recalled a history of damage to a leaf on one side of its stem and therefore dedicated its energy to growing
in the other direction. Since then, scientists have found that certain plants can remember experiences of drought and dehydration,
cold and heat, excess light, acidic soil, exposure to short-wave radiation, and a simulation of insects eating their leaves. Faced with
the same stress again, the plants modify their responses. They might retain more water, become more sensitive to light, or improve
their tolerance to salt or cold. In some cases, these memories are even passed down to the next generation, as Lysenko thought they
could be, though in an entirely different way than he imagined. We now know that plants are capable of much more than they’re
given credit for. They can “hear” vibrations, which might help them recognize insect attacks. They share information by

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 8 ]

broadcasting chemicals through the air or from their roots. In the study of the memories they form, the next step has been to
understand how they do it.

I n Melchers and Lang’s time, hormones were the leading edge of plant science. The technique for discovering new hormones was
elegantly brutish: Scientists ground up leaves before extracting and isolating the small molecules they released. They then
sprayed the hormones back onto plants to see what happened. Gibberellin, for instance, stimulates growth. Today, it’s sprayed on
grapes to make the fruit fatter and less tightly clumped. “A great deal of plant physiology was looking for these types of signals,”
says Richard Amasino, a professor of biochemistry at University of Wisconsin-Madison. “But the signals in flowering had not been
found, despite a lot of grinding up plants.”

By the 1970s and early ’80s, plant scientists still hadn’t found the biochemical secret to flowering. “When I began in science, this
was a big mystery,” says Amasino. To understand it and begin to unlock plant memory, scientists needed the insights of molecular
genetics and, in particular, epigenetics, the mechanisms that switch particular genes on and off.
In recent years, scientists have realized that the genome alone doesn’t determine an organism’s fate. There’s a whole world of
epigenetic activity around DNA that impacts which stretches of code get expressed, or translated into action. Florigen turned out to
be a tiny protein, too small for the techniques of Lang’s generation to identify. Even if they had found it, they would have been
missing a key to the mystery of what makes biennials flower. Amasino’s generation, on the other hand, finally found the right level
of activity—the epigenetic level—to see this process in action.

For example, the mechanism that controls vernalization and flowering in Arabidopsis thaliana, or thale cress, a plant often used as a
model in laboratories, is like a Rube Goldberg device of proteins and gene expression. The plant has a set of genes that create the
proteins that cause flowers to form. Before vernalisation the cells are full of a second protein, named FLC, that represses those key,
flower-promoting genes. But when the plant is exposed to cold, its cells slow the production of FLC until it stops, and the balance of
protein power then changes. The cells start producing more and more flower-promoting proteins, until the plant is ready to burst into
bloom. In this case, a simple way to think about this epigenetic action is as a switch. The cold acts as a signal to the cell to switch the
way its genes are expressed, from “don’t
flower” to “flower, flower, flower.” And
even when the cold signal is gone, the
switch stays flipped. So, when days
lengthen, the plants know it’s the right
time to bloom.

“Even when it’s spring and summer,”

explains Amasino, “whatever the cold did
remains as a memory.”

Arabidopsis thaliana, or thale cress

A re plants secretly soaking up

memories, flicking their epigenetic
switches on and off in response to
every significant stimulus they receive? It
seems unlikely. Last year, a group of plant
scientists based in Australia argued in the
journal Science Advances that, for plants,
forgetting (or not forming memories at all)

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [9 ]

may be a more powerful tool for survival than memory, and that “memory, in particular epigenetic memory, is likely a relatively rare
event.”

Peter Crisp, the lead author of the paper, now at University of Minnesota, makes it his job to stress plants out. He and his colleagues
might stop watering plants and let them dry out before hydrating the thirsty plants and watching how they recover. It’s been
established that in certain plants, epigenetic memories of drought, along with other stressors such as low light and herbivory, can
even make the leap across generations. So Crisp and his colleagues might do this for multiple generations (it gets interesting after
three) before testing if the plants remember the ordeal they’ve been through and become more tolerant of drought. “We don’t really
see that,” says Crisp.

Plants, he points out, have incredible abilities to rebound from stressful conditions. In a paper published this summer, for instance,
Crisp and his colleagues found that plants subjected to light stress rebounded rapidly—just think how, with the right care, a
neglected houseplant can bounce back from a wilted, brown mess. Scientists have now reported plenty of examples of plant memory
formation, but naturally they are less likely to publish results of experiments where plants could potentially form memories but don’t.
One of the biggest challenges of the field of study is even identifying whether a plant has formed a memory or not.

When Crisp and his colleagues design lab studies, they have to control for any number of confounding factors to determine if any
memories they observe are the result of the experimental stress. “It’s not as though the plant experiences something and says, ‘Oh, I
remember this,’” says Steven Eichten, Crisp’s coauthor, from the Australian National University. “It happens to have this chemical
marker, a change at a molecular level.” Identifying that change and attributing it to the experimental stress can be difficult. Even
when scientists know a memory can form in one plant, they may not necessarily recognize it in another. The memory mechanism
involving FLC that Amasino worked on, for instance, only works in thale cress. Beet plants and wheat plants have their own
molecular mechanisms of vernalisation which serve the same function but evolved independently. Identifying a true memory out in
the field is significantly harder.

In their experiments, however, Crisp and Eichten don’t observe many plant memories being formed. What if, they ask, plant memory
is rare simply because it’s better for plants to forget? “Having a memory, keeping track molecularly of signals that you’ve received
in the past from your environment, does have a cost,” says Eichten. “Since we don’t see memories all that often … maybe plants
don’t want to remember things all the time. Maybe it’s better to put their energies elsewhere.” Even when memories do form, they
can fade. Another research group has shown, for example, that a plant might form an epigenetic memory of salt stress and pass it
along across generations, but that if the stress fades, so does the memory. A plant that remembers too much might sacrifice healthy
growth to be constantly on guard against drought, flood, salt, insects. Better, perhaps, to let those negative experiences go, instead of
always preparing for the worst.

I t’s inevitable that we try to understand plant memory and cognition through our own experience of the world. To an extent, even
using the word “memory” is an evocative anthropic shorthand for what is actually going on in these plants. “We use the term
‘plant memory,’ but you could find other ways to try to describe it,” says Eichten. But “semi-heritable chromatin factors” doesn’t
quite have the same legibility. “Sometimes I have to try to explain my work to my mom, and you say, ‘Well, maybe it’s like a
memory … ’ Even if you think about human memories, it’s still kind of an abstract thing, right? You can think about neural
connections, but often in common dialogue, when you think of memory, you know what a memory is. At that level, maybe you don’t
care about where it’s coming from or what specific neurons are tied to it.”

That’s closer to the position from which Gagliano, the ecologist, approaches plant memory. Unlike the molecular geneticists, she’s
less interested in the specific mechanisms of memory formation than she is in the process of learning itself. “Of course plants can
remember,” she says. “I know that behaviorally a plant will exhibit a change in behavior that is predictable—if condition A is met,
then the plant should be able to do X. So by being able to do X, it means the plant has to remember what happened before, otherwise
he wouldn’t be able to do X.”

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 10 ]

The leaf-closing M. pudica isn’t the only plant that Gagliano can teach new tricks. In another experiment, she grew garden pea plants
in a Y-shaped maze and tested whether they could learn to associate different cues, wind and light. Plants gravitate toward light, and
in the experiment, Gagliano added an additional cue, airflow produced by a fan. For some of the plants, light and air flowed from the
same side of the Y-shape. For others, light and air came from different directions.

“With the peas, I turned the dial up,” she says. “Not only did the pea need to learn something, but he learned something that meant
nothing, that was totally irrelevant. Mimosa had to follow just one experience, the drop, ‘What does this mean?’ While the pea had to
follow two events occurring”—the fan and the light.

After training the plants, Gagliano withheld the light. When she next turned on the fans, she had switched them to the opposite
branch of the Y shape. She wanted to see if the plants had learned to associate airflow with light, or its absence, strongly enough to
react to the breeze, even if it was coming from a different direction, with no light as a signal. It worked. The plants that had been
trained to associate the two stimuli grew toward the fan; the plants that had been taught to separate them grew away from the airflow.

“In that context, memory is actually not the interesting bit—of course you have memory, otherwise you wouldn’t be able to do the
trick,” she says. “Memory is part of the learning process. But—who is doing the learning? What is actually happening? Who is it that
is actually making the association between fan and light?”

It’s telling that Gagliano uses the word “who,” which many people would be unlikely to apply to plants. Even though they’re alive,
we tend to think of plants as objects rather than dynamic, breathing, growing beings. We see them as mechanistic things that react to
simple stimuli. But to some extent, that’s true of every type of life on Earth. Everything that lives is a bundle of chemicals and
electrical signals in dialogue with the environment in which it exists. A memory, such as of the heat of summer on last year’s beach
vacation, is a biochemical marker registered from a set of external inputs. A plant’s epigenetic memory, of the cold of winter months,
on a fundamental level, is not so different. 

SARAH LASKOW
Atlas Obscura

KINGDOMS

In biology, kingdom (Latin: regnum, plural regna) is the second highest taxonomic rank, just
below domain. Kingdoms are divided into smaller groups called phyla. Traditionally, some
textbooks from the United States used a system of six kingdoms (Animalia, Plantae, Fungi,
Protista, Archaea/Archaeabacteria, and Bacteria/Eubacteria) while textbooks in Great Britain,
India, Australia, Latin America and other countries used five kingdoms (Animalia, Plantae,
Fungi, Protista and Monera). Some recent classifications based on modern cladistics have
explicitly abandoned the term "kingdom", noting that the traditional kingdoms are not
monophyletic, i.e., do not consist of all the descendants of a common ancestor.

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 11 ]

STRANGE FLOWER IS NEW TYPE OF POTATO ORCHID
NEW ZEALAND

Question: This strange flower popped up under a tree where

nothing's been planted before. There is no leaf growth and a
very woody looking stalk. Should I leave it be or root it out?

Answer: It is a native orchid, Gastrodia longcolumn, a member of the

Gastrodia family. This particular one hasn't been formally named,
according to the NZ Native Orchid Society, and has been dubbed
"longcolumn" in the meantime.

These orchids don't have leaves so can't make food from photosynthesis
(the sun) and instead use fungi to provide nutrients and sugars. (The
fungi in turn obtain their nutrition from tree and plant roots).

Commonly called potato orchids they form starchy underground tubers

regarded as delicacies by Maori who roasted them in embers or steamed
them in a hangi. The blackish-brown to pale brown streaked or spotted
stems are 5-10mm in diameter and up to 1m tall.

Up to 60 knobby flowers per stem bloom from December to January.

Flowers in deep shade are often darker than those in well-lit spots. They
are usually found beneath beech, kanuka or rhododendrons in forests or
scrub.

Longcolumn may not be an endangered native species but it's certainly

special. ■

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 12 ]

TREATING STORM DAMAGED ORCHIDS IN FLORIDA AFTER HURRICANES
Post storm activity is important. First, be prepared to quickly replace shade either on the structure itself or by jury-rigging shade
cloth until the structure can be rebuilt. The plants themselves will have been severely stunned, bruised or nicked by buffeting winds.
Often the plants will have been dark and wet for many, many hours. These conditions are the most highly conducive for fungal and
bacterial development. While the plants are still wet they can be sprayed with a tertiary ammonia product Physan, Consan, or
Greenshield (pool algicide contains the same chemical). This has the advantage of blending with the water on the plants to provide
some immediate protection. Once the plants are dry again, they can be sprayed with a broad spectrum fungicide/bactericide. Cupric
hydroxide (Kocide, Champion) mixed with Mancozeb (Manzate, Dithane M45) at 1 tbs per gallon of each should do a good job.

Again, a spreader sticker is highly desirable here. The strategy for all the next few weeks post storm is to keep the plants as dry as
possible (most will be moving toward more dormant states in September and October, in any case). Close monitoring for disease
development and excising damaged tissue as disease develops are essential. This should be done with a clean instrument that is
disinfected between cuts, preferably with a supersaturated solution of tri-sodium phosphate , Clorox, pool algicide or by flaming the
cutting edge. Much wet weather can still be forth-coming after a hurricane and disease control and prevention will be a long term
task post storm. We all hope that none of us ever again need to know these things we old Florida hands have learned across the years,
but hurricanes are a price of living in paradise. The wise children make preparations early for all the other storm needs; buying
supplies, filling gas tanks, trimming trees, removing debris so that at the eleventh hour all efforts can be concentrated on what is truly
important; protecting our orchids and other equally beloved family.

TREATING STORM DAMAGED PLANTS

Hurricane or even tropical force winds are not kind to vegetation. Orchids that have weathered the storm in our gardens are very
likely to have sustained some damage. Frequently leaves or stems are broken. Even more frequently the plants have been scraped by
rubbing against themselves or some object in the buffeting winds. Wind blown debris can also cut or scrape exposed plants. Careful
examination of those plants which could not be brought in out of the storm will usually reveal numerous cuts, scrapes and bruises,
particularly on leaf margins. These wounds are unfortunately the potential points of entry for bacterial and fungal infection. Our
plants need help in warding off these potential problems. As with all else in good orchid management the first defense is to be sure to
dry the plants as thoroughly as possible. After a storm one should not even think of watering orchids. The rains of the storm will
have been more than enough, if not too much. Most sympodial orchids are at the end of their growth cycles and are slowing down to
a rate requiring less water. Vandas and Phalaenopsis are luxuriating in the extra heavy humidity (that the air conditioned populous
loves to hate) and hence require a good deal less water as well. Water such monopodial orchids only when a rare few days pass
without any rain. Drying storm-damaged orchids will allow those nicks and scratches to heal to a naturally resistant toughness. Often
the weather of September and October is not kind enough (even when we have already suffered) to permit sufficient drying to cure
the ravages of the storm. The persistent damp characteristic of late summer usually dictates more active intervention. Painting
wounded spots with fungicide can often prevent infections. Many growers adverse to chemicals use ground cinnamon for this
purpose. A bolder and surer treatment is a combination of equal parts cupric hydroxide (Kocide) and mancozeb (Manzate or Dithane
M45). This should be made into a slurry and painted on wounded places.

Never, never, apply chemicals as a dust. The potential to inhale pure forms of agricultural chemicals is too, too, dangerous. Indeed, it
is recommended that when handling chemicals to make a slurry, a respirator or paint mask be worn to avoid inhaling the air borne
particles. Rubber or vinyl gloves are advised when actually applying this mixture. Cupric hydroxide and mancozeb can also be
applied as a spray at the rate of one tablespoon each per gallon of water. Spraying the entire collection will go a long way toward
preventing isolated problems from becoming epidemic. If the weather is so unremittingly wet that spray cannot be applied, a
quaternary ammonium product (Physan, etc. or pool algicide) can be sprayed as recommended elsewhere.

MARTIN MOTES - MIAMI, FL

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 13 ]

ORCHID FEATURES, EVOLUTIONARY HISTORY INFORMED BY
NEW GENOME
With the help of a new orchid genome sequence, an international team led by investigators in China, Belgium, Taiwan, and Japan
has gained new insights into orchid evolution and adaptations.

Using a combination of short- and long-read sequencing, 10x Genomics scaffolding, and other approaches, the researchers came up
with a draft genome sequence for Apostasia shenzhenica. Along with an annotation of the genome, helped along by new
transcriptome sequences, they performed comparative genomics and phylogenetics analyses to look at orchid relationships and
ancestral orchid features.

"The genome sequence of A. shenzhenica, an orchid belonging to a small clade that is sister to the rest of Orchidaceae, provides a
reference for studying orchid evolution, revealing clear evidence of an ancient [whole genome duplication] shared by all orchids,
facilitating reconstruction of the ancestral orchid gene toolkit, and providing insights into many orchid-specific features," the authors
of the new study, published in Nature today, wrote. The study was led by investigators at the Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Orchid
Conservation and Utilization and other centers in China, Belgium, Taiwan, and Japan.

After isolating genomic DNA from leaf, stem, and flower samples collected from A. shenzhenica plants in southeastern China, the
researchers used Illumina HiSeq 2000 and PacBio RS sequencers to generate short and long reads to put together a draft genome for
the plant and fill gaps.

The team estimated that the resulting genome — which also included sequences and scaffolds produced with 10x Genomics
technology and spanned some 349 million bases — is nearly 94 percent complete.

With the new genome and RNA sequences generated for the same orchid tissues using Illumina HiSeq 2000 reads, the researchers
identified 21,841 predicted protein-coding genes. More than 92 percent of those genes were represented in the transcriptome
sequences.

From there, they analyzed A. shenzhenica sequences in conjunction with sequences from more than a dozen other plant species for a
phylogenetic analysis based on a few hundred single-copy gene families. The investigators also searched for gene families that
appeared to have ballooned or dwindled over the course of orchid evolution, along with other clues to past genome duplications or
alterations.

For example, the team's analyses suggest that the A. shenzhenica lineage has undergone at least two whole-genome duplications: one
event that occurred in the ancestors of orchids and lineages leading to pineapple, asparagus, and other monocot plants, and a more
recent, orchid-specific whole-genome duplication that took place not long after Orchidaceae plants started diversifying.

And because the A. shenzhenica plant has some physical features that differ from those found in other orchids — including relatively
rudimentary reproductive structures and an undifferentiated version of the labellum or lip that most orchids use to lure in pollinators
— the investigators were able to begin teasing apart the genetic contributors to some specialized orchid traits.

"We identify new gene families, gene family expansions and contractions, and changes within MADS-box gene classes, which
control a diverse suite of developmental processes during orchid evolution," the authors wrote, noting that their work "sheds new
light on the genetic mechanisms underpinning key orchid innovations."

GENOMEWEB

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 14 ]

POSSIBLE NEW ORCHID EXTINCTIONS
Scientists and conservationists don’t declare a species extinct all that often because, well, hope remains eternal. Even if they know
that an existing population disappears, there’s always the possibility that the species itself still exists on the next hill over, or under a
rock, or somewhere we have yet to search.

Sometimes, however, hope is hard to hang on to. That’s why 25 species have just been identified as “critically endangered, possibly
extinct” in the latest update to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

The list of possibly extinct species includes a frog, numerous orchids, several Hawaiian plants and a lost legume—all of which have
not been seen for many years, but none of which conservationists have completely given up hope about.

Bulbophyllum erythroglossum, B. hirsutiusculum, B. minax, B. sanguineum and B. tampoketsense — These orchids, all native to
Madagascar, each had incredibly small known habitats which have now been degraded by wood harvesting and subsistence
agriculture. Illegal orchid collectors also took their toll. They were last seen in 1964, 1928, 1919, 1925 and 1923, respectively.

Cynorkis bimaculata, C. catatii, C. rolfei and C. sylvatica — More missing Madagascar orchids. Last seen in 1961, 1889, 1903 and
1951.

Disperis bosseri, Eulophia grandidieri and Hymenodictyon seyrigii — More orchids. Last seen in 1957, 1901 and 1942.

Cynorkis sylvatica
Cynorkis bimaculata

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 15 ]

TWO EXCITING IRISH DISCOVERIES
The green-flowered helleborine is one of Ireland's rarest orchids. Found in a variety of habitats and also in a variety of forms, it is
elusive and seldom seen in numbers more than a dozen.

In 2015 Jackie O Connell, who previously presented an illustrated talk to the Irish Orchid Society, noticed an interesting plant when
visiting an old friend in Co. Kildare. Although confident that it was the green flowered helleborine he had Brendan Sayers pay a visit
and confirm the identification. It was indeed Epipactis phyllanthes and unusually in great numbers. The plants grew alongside a
stream that flows through old demesne woodland on the property. A short time later access to the adjoining property expanded the
population and estimates of flowering plants is close to 500 for the 2017 flowering season.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 16 ]

This is the first record for the green-flowered helleborine in Co. Kildare and the largest known population in Ireland or Great Britain.
Another interesting point (a debatable point!) is that the population is best attributed to Epipactis phyllanthes var. pendula when
other Irish populations are attributed to Epipactis phyllanthes var. vectensis.

The presence of so many plants will give the unusual opportunity to examine traits of the species that have been documented from
much smaller populations and help add more knowledge to this seldom seen species.

The second cause for celebration is the identification of a hybrid

between the common spotted orchid and the dense flowered fragrant
orchid. This occurred when Brian Kelly of the National Botanic
Gardens was showing some smart phone pictures of wild orchids in
Co. Wicklow to Brendan Sayers. In the batch was a photograph of the
seldom encountered hybrid. Hybrids between Dactylorhiza and
Gymnadenia belong to the hybrid genus × Dactylodenia.

The hybrid do not have a commonly used hybrid combination so is

identified by it parent cross, Dactylorhiza fuchsii × Gymnadenia
densiflora. 

BRENDAN SAYERS

IN THE NEWS, August 25, 2017

A Rare Find—National Botanic Gardens

The National Botanic Gardens are pleased to announce a significant

find in Ireland's botanical world. The green flowered helleborine
(Epipactis phyllanthes) is a rare Irish orchid confined to little more
than a dozen sites on the island. Its rarity and variability makes for
much debate among botanists and orchid lovers alike.

A new population, studied since it was first observed in 2015 by John

(Jackie) O'Connell, is located on private property in Co. Kildare.
Jackie is an enthusiastic naturalist and photographer and is well
known for his wildflower meadow, which abounded with orchids, on
the church grounds when he was Parish Priest in Caragh, Co.
Kildare.

A further alert from the adjoining property led to what may be the
largest population of green flowered helleborine ever recorded in
Ireland or Britain. There were an estimated 500 flowering spikes in
Dactylorhiza fuchsii × Gymnadenia densiflora 2017.

A more detailed account of the study by staff at the Gardens in

conjunction with the property owners and Jackie will appear in
botanical news over the coming months.

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 17 ]

THE GREAT CYMBIDIUM MYTH

HIT AND MYTH: Despite rumours to the contrary the stunning Cymbidium orchid is, in fact, as easy to grow as any other potted
plant.

During the past two hundred years,

countless myths have arisen around
the Cymbidium orchid with its sprays
of exotic blooms. This mythical aura
has resulted in the flowers gaining a
reputation of being too temperamental
to grow successfully and almost
impossible to flower.

But nothing could be further from the

truth. In fact, Cymbidiums are as easy
to grow and flower as any other
potted plant given a few essential
requirements.

Light is of great importance for

flowering success.

Low summer night temperatures are

appreciated, thus summer quarters
consisting of an open shade house
covered with fifty per cent shade
cloth will allow air to circulate,
another important requirement as well
as the cooler evenings.

To water during summer I run a

sprinkler in the shade house for about
half an hour every day at noon so the
leaves are dry by nightfall.

Once a week I check the compost in a couple of pots and hand-water if they feel dry. Remember like most pot plants more
cymbidiums are killed by over-watering than any other single cause. If in doubt whether to water or not, don’t.

When you notice flower spikes beginning to show the orchids must have protection from frost and rain as both can damage or even
destroy the spikes.

Covering the roof of the shade house with plastic will give the plants cover from the harsh elements. Alternatively you can grow the
Cymbidiums in a plastic tunnel-type structure and place the orchids under a shade tree for the summer period before bringing them
back indoors for the cooler months to flower.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 18 ]

Before returning the plants to the plastic house, it pays to give them a spray with an insecticide to kill any stray insects or their eggs
because these may cause damage to the plants and their flower spikes.

If in doubt whether to water or not, don’t.

Crowded conditions are not favorable to flowering and the rule is to place the pots a pot’s-width apart. This space allows good air
circulation, effective watering and less chance of insect infestation or disease.

Various types of composts are used throughout the world to grow cymbidium orchids all of which are equally successful. The pH
should ideally be slightly acidic. Some ready-mixed composts also contain an even balance of nutrients.

Cymbidiums should be repotted in early spring or straight after flowering.

Plants only need repotting or dividing up when they have filled the pot with roots or have grown too large for the pot. When
repotting, take care not to over-pot as cymbidiums like to be slightly root-bound. The pot should fit around the orchid leaving a space
of around two centimeters to accommodate new growth.

LES HODGE

HOW I BECAME A MEMBER OF THE IOS — PETER STILLER

Peter Stiller, also a member of the Deutsche Orchideen-Gesellschaft, writes from Germany remembering how in 1997 his friend
Huntley Lauder send him a copy of The Irish Garden with an article on orchid collecting in Belize.

Although it took six years, he finally made a visit to Dublin to meet with Brendan Sayers and Marie Hourigan at the National
Botanic Gardens where "I walked the entire gardens and among many interesting specimen plants and trees, a cork oak caught my
attention, which I had never seen before in nature".

Peter also viewed the various glasshouses that held the orchid collection with Marie and was "especially impressed by the gigantic
pots of mature Cymbidiums.”

Later that evening Brendan "took me by car to an area where he showed me several species of local wild orchids. On that wonderful
day, I became a member of the Irish Orchid Society in spirit as well as de facto, which I remain to this day. Even though I live
several flight hours away from Dublin I always receive Pollinia, which allows me to be part of the IOS from afar."

TO ALL MEMBERS
What do you like about the IOS? We would appreciate it if you would email either myself or Brendan with a short opinion. We will
include comments in a future edition of Pollinia, edited should you be too loquacious in praise. Thank you. The Editor

Brendan Sayers: brendan.sayers@opw.ie

Laurence May: ios.pollinia@gmail.com

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 19 ]

ATSUMORISO - CYPRIPEDIUM HOTEI ATSUMORIANUM
Atsumoriso (Cypripedium macranthos var. speciosum) is an orchid that bears
reddish purple flowers during the rainy season. The blooms resemble a croissant
with a ribbon tied around it.

Called the “king of wild orchids,” Atsumoriso is adored by flower lovers. But it
has long been feared that it may die out. In particular, a variety called Kamanashi
Hotei Atsumoriso (Cypripedium hotei atsumorianum ) has become so scarce that
it has gained the moniker “phantom flower.”

This variety grows naturally on Mount Kamanashi in Shinshu (the old name of
Nagano Prefecture) and is characterized by its roundish flowers.

The town of Fujimi in Nagano Prefecture has been putting a great deal of effort
into protecting and cultivating Atsumoriso.

Clusters of Atsumoriso used to be found widely on Kamanashi and neighboring

Mount Nyukasa. But the numbers declined sharply due to illegal collection,
animal damage and changes in the environment caused by afforestation.

Eleven years ago, local residents and town government officials set up a group
dedicated to repopulating the endangered species. They started by trying to find areas where the plant grows naturally.

They discovered four Atsumoriso roots after clambering up cliffs and going deep into the mountains.

“Our tenacious efforts paid off,” said Hiroshi Nakayama, 77, head of the group. “When we found them, my heart was filled with
emotion, and I thought we had to protect them at any cost.” The group’s members installed nets to keep wild animals at bay and set
up cameras to deter people from illegally digging up the plant. These efforts have led to a 10-fold increase in the number of
Atsumoriso growing in the wild. But it was much more difficult to propagate the plant through cross-fertilization and cultivation.

The group, with the help of companies and high schools, carried out a number of experiments for artificial reproduction. But barely
one in a thousand seedlings they planted grew to flower. It proved to be much tougher than imagined.

The name Atsumoriso comes from warlord Taira no Atsumori (1169-1184), who was killed by enemy warrior Kumagai Naozane in
the Battle of Ichinotani during a conflict between the Heike (Taira) and Minamoto families.

The plant was so named apparently because the glamorous flower was reminiscent of the armor that Atsumori wore.

Atsumori became a symbol of the tragic saga of the downfall of the Heike family, which was once in power and reveled in
prosperity, but the orchid named after him is now being brought back from the brink of extinction.

The noble and elegant flower appears to be a crystallization of the indomitable spirit of the local people who have worked so hard to
preserve its beauty.

THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

***
The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 20 ]
MEMBERS NIGHT - OCTOBER 2, 2017

A good night for plants and great to see Brendan Sayers's Vanda hybrids in flower again. Their appearance last years was after
they had spent the summer outdoors but conditions in 2017 never settled enough for them to take their summer holidays. It did not
seem to affect them in any negative way and both looked fresh and full.

Along with some iPad images of more Vanda, Coelogyne and Miltonia spectabilis, Phillipa Thomas brought along a flowering
division of the latter and some Pleurothallids which were in perfect foliage and showing signs of flower buds. It looked like
Pleurothallis paliolata would be first to the post.

Two pots of Ornithophora radicans made it along and Mark Garvey showed a beautiful Oncidium noezliana (syn. Cochlioda
noezliana), the beautiful Coelogyne speciosa var. salmonicolor and a small plant of Dendrobium pantherinum with large nodding
flower.

Aleksandra Kuchartczyk presented the highlight of the evening in Habenaria medusa.

BRENDAN SAYERS

Habenaria medusa.

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 21 ]

 One of the rarest orchids east of
the Mississippi, the Small-
whorled pogonia, Isotria
medeoloides, ('little five leaves,')
emerges from a long dormancy
when there is an abundance of
specific fungi in the soil.

Orchids can hide. Members of

this diverse family of plants,
known for their wildly attractive
flowers, have long been
recognized for their ability to
enter extended periods of
dormancy—sometimes for a year
or longer. The plants take refuge
underground, and with no leaves
SOLVED and no need for photosynthesis,
the orchids rely on fungi for the
A MYSTERY OF nutrients they need to survive.
HIDING ORCHIDS Scientists have long puzzled over
what prompts the plants to switch
Smithsonian scientists from a state of dormancy and
send up shoots. Now, a new study
have discovered what by a group of scientists from the Small -Whorled Pogonia
triggers the rare Smithsonian Environmental
small-whorled pogonia to Research Center in Edgewater,
awaken from dormancy Maryland, explains how concentrations of certain fungus in the soil cause one North
American species of orchid, the Small-whorled pogonia, to awaken.

“This is an extremely rare orchid and as rare as it is, it's not as rare as we thought
because it spends a lot of time hiding out underground,” says Smithsonian ecologist
Melissa McCormick, one of the authors of the paper. “We had done some previous
research into orchid mycorrhizal fungi. . . we were interested in whether the abundance
of fungi in the soil was affecting not just where they are, but also when they emerge.”

The fungi turned out to be the key. Most orchids form symbiotic partnerships with
particular species of fungi in order to survive. Orchid seeds lack the starchy endosperm
that helps to feed the new sprouts of many other types of plants. Instead, the seeds
depend on mycorrhizal fungus in the soil. They only send a shoot up when it is time to
flower and reproduce. The Small-whorled pogonia has this relationship with a
mycorrhizal fungus in the Russulaceae family.

Smithsonian researcher Melissa McCormick says there is a link between the dormancy
period of the small-whorled pogonias and the amount of a specific type of fungus in the
soil.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 22 ]

McCormick analyzed the DNA of soil samples collected immediately adjacent to wild Small-
whorled pogonias, and used that data to calculate how much Russulaceae hyphae was present
in the soil at each site.

When McCormick and the four other scientists involved with the research compared the
abundance of Russulaceae in the soil with the frequency that the dormant pogonias awoke
and sent up shoots, they found a clear relationship: Greater populations of the fungus meant
that the rare pogonias were more likely to emerge. In other words, more of the right fungus in
the soil helps the orchid to come out of dormancy more often.

In the past, without the ability to analyze the DNA of a sample, it wasn't practical to calculate
exactly how much of any one fungus was present. Even under a microscope, a lot of fungi
look very similar. “In a sample of soil the size of a lima bean you have probably several
hundred species of fungus,” McCormick says.

“This fungal aspect of all this work has been known since Darwin's time,” says Dennis
Whigham, senior botanist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center and a co-author
of the study. “But only in recent years have we been able to really go after it and look at the Melissa McCormick
DNA of the fungi to see what they are.”

Pelotons
When fungi come into contact with an orchid root, they form pelotons, or coiled balls, that the orchid uses for nutrients. Some of the
showiest orchids from tropical regions have lent the impression that orchids are an exotic, tropical group of plants. But orchids are
actually very widespread, even in the United States. “We have over 200 species and they occur in every state,” Whigham says.
“About 60 percent of them are in trouble somewhere that they occur.”

The decline of many populations of American

orchids prompted Whigham and others to help
create the North American Orchid Conservation
Center, based out of the Smithsonian
Environmental Research Center. The center
works with around 50 collaborators to preserve
habitats and to bank seeds and samples of
mycorrhizal fungi, and conduct studies like this
one.

What does the fungus get out of this relationship

with the orchid? Probably not much.

“All terrestrial plants on Earth have interactions

with fungi,” Whigham says. Those partnerships
are called 'mutualistic.' But almost all of the
evidence indicates that in a fungi-orchid
relationship, the orchid is a very needy partner.

Pelotons

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 23 ]

 BOOK REVIEW
R unning up the drive of our family home, straightening my jacket as I went, I
prayed that I could glide seamlessly back into my mother's 50th birthday party
without anyone realising I had slipped out for an hour or so.

The several glasses of champagne I'd plied Mum with would surely make her less
HOW A observant.

CHARMING And although Dad's texts had been increasingly suspicious — 'Where are you?' quickly
OXFORD REJECT followed by 'Seriously, where are you?' — he might assume that I had just been
mingling with other guests elsewhere in the house.
BECAME THE
Unfortunately, there was a flaw in my plan. They spotted my dishevelled tie, crumpled
FIRST BOTANIST trousers and mud-scuffed shoes.
TO HUNT DOWN The truth was that I'd nipped out to scramble around a nearby nature reserve in search
EVERY ONE OF of an elusive plant known as the Burnt Orchid.
BRITAIN'S 52 I was soon forgiven. My parents are both vicars, stoic by nature and surprised by few
WILD ORCHIDS things. They're also used to my peculiarities.

The Orchid Hunter: A Young
Botanist's Search For Happiness
But even they were taken aback by the botanical challenge I'd embarked upon shortly
before Mum's party in June 2013.
Then 18, I had failed to secure a place at Oxford University. When I opened the
rejection letter I knew I could reapply for the following year and decided immediately
what I wanted to do with the time in between.

No botanist had ever seen every species of orchid native to the British Isles in one
season and I intended to be the first.

When friends asked about my plans for my gap year I lied. Botany is not considered
cool by teenagers and to admit you like it is to surrender to merciless teasing.

Part of my embarrassment was that, while others enjoyed

hedonistic trips to Thailand or did charitable work in
Africa, I would be travelling around Britain. But I felt this
might finally satisfy my nerdy obsession with orchids.

The Heath Fragrant Orchid (right) is one of 52 species of

wild orchids found in the UK

Adding these to the ones still taunting me from the pages of

my wildlife guides, I had 52 species to see in one summer.

It would be a superhuman endeavour because, although the

orchid flowering season stretches from April to late

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 24 ]

September, different species bloom at
different times, some for only two or three
days, others for a week. Miss just one
window of opportunity and I might never
see a particular orchid in flower that
summer.
I hated the idea of failing but I was excited
beyond belief at the prospect of my orchid
summer and got a job at Waitrose to help
fund it. Stacking shelves as I waited for
the season to begin, my daydreams of wild
-flowers in the sun soon became hidden
behind the rain-lashed windows of a never
-ending winter.
Finally a string of fine days in early May
brought the year's first butterflies. Orange-
tips and brimstones danced around the
garden and internet botany forums
exploded with reports of Early Spider
Orchids at Durlston Country Park, near
Swanage in Dorset.
Lizard Orchid
An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach
The problem was how to get there since
my second-hand Vauxhall, was back in the
garage for the umpteenth time and it
wasn't until mid-May that I could finally
set off on the 60-mile drive.
I had only passed my test four months
previously. And, since I had yet to
undertake a long-distance journey,
repeated concerns about my safety,
whether the sat-nav would work and what
would happen if I put the wrong fuel in my
car, had been expressed in the Bersweden
household.
Somehow I arrived unscathed and strode
out onto the hillside at Durlston. The
wonderful melody of a skylark floated
down from above as my eyes settled on the
yellow sea of cowslips stretching all the
way up the meadow and it was like a
switch was thrown somewhere deep inside The Lady Orchid is one of the many
me. flowers that inspired Mr Bersweden.
widow offered them to me. They were, she
I was in plant-hunting mode. Before long, said, his legacy.
I found the exquisite little plants I sought,
with the large, brown, chocolatey lip Dad suggested we transfer them to the
which resembles the legless body of a churchyard and it was twilight by the time
spider. we arrived with a groundsheet laden with
soil full of orchids.
I lay on my stomach, eyes and camera lens
focused on their tiny forms as, with each Imagine the gossip had anyone been
gust of wind, they shivered and seemed to passing the church at this late hour and
draw their spiders closer, clustering for seen the vicar and his son lift a heavy
warmth. tarpaulin out of the car before digging in a
discreet corner of the graveyard and
Grinning from ear to ear at seeing such a carefully lowering the contents into the
rare specimen, I continued walking. As I ground.
reached Dancing Ledge, a disused
limestone quarry at the base of the cliffs, a Those orchids have since dwindled in
spike of pink caught my eye. Nestled in number, too disturbed by the change in
the grass were three green-winged orchids. conditions. But it was worth trying to save
them because the green-winged orchid is
My only experience of these was when I declining with dramatic speed with the
was 15 and my father presided over the disappearance of the hay meadows in
funeral of a man who had devoted his life which it once thrived.
to nurturing a colony on his lawn. His
Volume 16, Issue One [ 25 ]
I was delighted with my finds that first In the far northern reaches of Scotland, I
afternoon but longed to share my travels ticked off the dumpy purple Hebridean
with someone. Ironically, orchids have Marsh Orchid. I drove nearly 10,000
symbolised romance, sex and seduction miles, taking more than 50,000 photos and
throughout history and for centuries were passing through 48 counties.
believed to have aphrodisiac properties.
Along the way I hunted for the
But attractive, orchid-inclined females are orchidophiles' Holy Grail — a species
hard to come by and I worried that girls known as Lady's Slipper. Declared extinct
would ridicule me if they found out about in Britain in 1917, it was rediscovered in
my botanising. Instead of the terrifying 1930 by two cotton-weaver brothers from
prospect of talking to them, I spent my Silsden in Yorkshire.
adolescent years combing fields and
woods for plants. This single plant remains the only one in
Fly Orchid otherwise known as an the wild, its stunning spirals of claret and
Consequently I was about as close to Ophrys insectifera bubbles of yellow a feast for the senses,
having a girlfriend as I was to finding a but it is under round-the-clock surveillance
Summer Lady's-tresses orchid, last seen in at a secret location, protected by a
1959 and now extinct because of over- There, in a sheltered hollow, was the committee including representatives from
enthusiastic collectors. glorious pink flower of an Irish Marsh Kew, Natural England and the National
Orchid. I had only found it thanks to Trust. A warden lives in a hut nearby and
My love-life was a subject soon to be Michael's prying and a beam spread across monitors trip-wires surrounding the caged
broached by my godfather Michael, a kind his face as I shared my joy with him. flower.
-hearted Geordie who was a Catholic
priest in Yorkshire. I treasure that memory because it was the There are rum-ours he carries a shotgun
last time I saw Michael. He passed away and he turns all inquisitive orchid lovers
Over the winter, I'd spent a long time the following year and I'm so grateful for away, even though the most desperate
discussing my plans with him and he that week we had together. have been known to offer bribes: money,
joined me on my next trip, a week in the whisky, Wimbledon tickets.
west of Ireland, to track down Dense- Eight years previously, he had given me a
flowered and Irish Marsh Orchids. gift which changed the way I observed the All I knew was that the Lady Slipper was
natural world — the camera was now hidden somewhere in the Yorkshire Dales.
I could find neither and frustration flooded forever in my hands. For the first time, he For days I searched to no avail, then, lost
through me until the very last evening had got to see me using it and in my in an old and sombre wood, I chanced
when we strolled along the cliffs near the element. across a fence with a gate and 'No Entry'
small seaside town of Ballybunion. daubed on a wooden sign slung over the
Searching for orchids has always brought barbed wire.
'So, do your girlfriends know about this me closer to who I really am and melted
orchid thing?' he asked, eyes twinkling away the strains of everyday life. The nearest public footpath was miles
mischievously. I sighed and, spying a away. It made no sense to have a gate here
promising area of reeds in an adjacent But in the following months there were unless . . . suddenly I spotted a dark-green
field, took advantage of a broken wire many stresses as I tried to keep up with the cabin, as camouflaged as a chameleon, and
fence to escape the uncomfortable flowering periods of the different species then a flash of gold in the ferns.
conversation. up and down the country.
The furthest I travelled south was Jersey, I'd found the Lady Slipper's quiet
I ambled around in a nearby field for a home to the strutting super-models which sanctuary. My stomach lurched. It was like
while and then, halfway back to the car, I are the tall, pink Loose-flowered Orchids. nothing I had ever experienced.
stopped and smiled.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 26 ]

The warden strode purposefully towards right patch and standing proudly in the the Irish Sea.
me. I noted with relief that he didn't seem middle of it, were Suzie's two Fen
to be carrying a shotgun but, even after Orchids, one in bud, the other in perfect As July faded into August, Suzie
half an hour of pleading, he refused to let flower. accompanied me to Lough Cullin in the
me get close enough to photograph the west of Ireland to see the orchid known as
orchid. This elicited a reaction one would Irish Lady's-tresses.
normally associate with a last-minute title-
Although I felt defeated, I knew that so winning goal: 'Yes, yes, yes, get in!' I Beautiful, entertaining and like-minded,
many people had tried and failed to find whooped, my mad shouts whipped away she was the perfect orchid-hunting
this plant but I, at least, had sneaked a by the wind as I danced with excitement. companion and when we returned to
look. England I worked up the courage to ask
I didn't know it then but Suzie was about her out. Her swift rejection was as painful
That was a highlight of my travels but to have a much bigger impact on my as I had expected.
there were also lows, most notably when I summer.
sought the Fen Orchids of Kenfig National We wanted different things, she said. We
Nature Reserve in Glamorgan, South Five years older than me, she was an were living halfway across the country. I
Wales. ornithologist who had discovered a was going to university. All logical
passion for orchids and we struck up an arguments, but no less difficult to take.
After four hours of searching in the sand online friendship, messaging to discuss
dunes proved fruitless, despite detailed which ones to see next. With the rejection still raw, at the
instructions from Suzie Lane, an internet beginning of September I set out to find
contact who'd seen the plants two days Towards the end of July, I invited her to the one orchid still on my list: Autumn
previously, I was panicking. In my tightly- North Wales in search of the Dark-red Lady's-tresses, one of the commoner
scheduled summer, this was my one Helleborine species. British species.
opportunity to see these plants flowering.
We had never met and I was nervous as I It seemed satisfyingly symmetrical to
When I finally found them, there were arrived early to pick her up at Chester finish my journey where it had started five
leaves but no flowers: they'd been a tasty station. I'd tried not to build this up in my months previously, at Durlston Country
snack for a passing rabbit. head as a big deal, but had. Park.

Despair swept through me and I sank to Twenty agonising minutes later, I walked The end came very quickly. Walking
my knees, unwilling to accept that I had over to the entrance to wait. I checked my down a precipitous gulley, I saw a slender
failed as I contemplated the long phone: no messages. twirl of white.
disappointing drive home.
Then I felt a tap on my shoulder and there There, poking out from behind a tuft of
This wasn't fair I thought, searching my she was, tall with wavy auburn hair and a yellowing grass, was an Autumn Lady's-
phone for the photo of the tiny plants camera bag slung over her shoulder. tresses. Its snowy flowers twisted
Suzie had spotted, as if seeing them would skyward: a bride on her wedding day.
magically bring them back. Suddenly hope Five minutes into our journey, any initial
returned. tension had passed. Before long we were I had seen every last orchid on my list.
sharing our strangest orchid-hunting Extraordinary. The following year, I
The nibbled plants in front of me were experiences and taking it in turns to finally made it to Oxford and, having spent
alone in the sand but near the orchids in photograph helleborines by the roadside. three years studying biology, I have
Suzie's photo were some Lesser This brought my number of species seen to somewhat inevitably returned to orchids:
Spearwort, a buttercup-yellow flower. 40, so we celebrated with ice creams and a my PhD thesis is on, among other things,
round of mini-golf atop the Great Orme, a how best to protect endangered
Using these as a guide, I quickly found the large limestone headland protruding into populations.

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 27 ]

Mine was a humble achievement but it was one I felt incredibly proud of and that summer is one I will remember for the rest of my
life. ■

Adapted from The Orchid Hunter: A Young Botanist's Search For Happiness by Leif Bersweden, published by Short Books.

LEIF BERSWEDEN

Orchis apiphera

IOS columnist Zoë Devlin is passionate about wildflowers and the environment. She combined her interests
in botany and photography by developing the website: www.wildflowersofireland.net

Zoë’s new book, Blooming Marvellous: A Wildflower Hunter's Year, was published by The Collins
Press on 18 September and is available in all good bookshops and online from: www.collinspress.ie

The book will be reviewed in the next issue of Pollinia. ISBN: 978-1848893276

Mozart's Starling – by Lyanda Lynn Haupt ISBN: 978-1472153050

On May 27th, 1784, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart met in a Viennese shop a little starling which sang an
improvised version of the theme from his Piano Concerto no. 17 in G major. Mozart bought him and took him
home to be a family pet. For three years, the starling lived with Mozart, influencing his work and serving as
his companion, distraction, consolation, and muse. After rescuing a baby starling of her own, Haupt found
herself enchanted by the same intelligence and playful spirit that had so charmed her favorite composer.

In Mozart's Starling, Haupt explores the unlikely and remarkable bond between one of history's most
esteemed composers and one of earth's most common birds. The intertwined stories of Mozart's beloved pet
Star and Haupt's own starling Carmen provide an unexpected window into human-animal friendships, music,
the world of starlings, and the nature of creative inspiration. A blend of natural history, biography, and
memoir, Mozart's Starling is a tour de force that awakens a surprising new awareness of our place in the
world.

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 28 ]

NEW ORCHID SPECIES FOUND ONLY ON JAVA ISLAND

The new orchid, Gastrodia bambu, is

found mostly in West Java and Mount
Merapi in Yogyakarta, Indonesia

MALANG • Indonesian botanists have

revealed their discovery of a new orchid
species endemic to Java island. The
species, Gastrodia bambu, was discovered
by botanist Destario Metusala of the
Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) at
the Purwodadi Botanical Gardens in
Central Java.

The discovery was revealed in Phytotaxa,

an international scientific journal,
published last month. The publication was
written by Mr Destario and Dr Jatna
Supriatna, a scientist with the University
of Indonesia biological conservation
department.

Mr Destario said the species was part of the holomikotropic orchid group, the orchids of which were often called "ghost orchids" due
to their life cycle, which takes place in stages almost entirely underground, emerging above ground only when flowering. The name
bambu (bamboo), he added, referred to its specific habitat.

"The entire population was found very close to old bamboo clumps, growing in wet soil containing partly decomposed bamboo leaf
litter, in the very deep shade cast by the bamboo plant's canopy."

Mr Destario added that the Gastrodia bambu was found only on Java Island, mostly in West Java and Mount Merapi in Yogyakarta.

"Besides Mount Merapi, we also discovered the species at Mount Gede-Pangrango in West Java, the home of other species of the
ghost orchid family. The species is very resistant to drought, excess light intensity and small changes occurring in the place where it's
growing," he said.

The population has declined because of clear-cutting of bamboo clumps for logs and hot clouds intermittently released by Mount
Merapi, a highly active volcano.

Local botanists estimate that fewer than 1,000 orchids of the new species exist today.

STRAITSTIMES.COM

An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach Volume 16, Issue One [ 29 ]

IOS MEMBERS: HYLDA J. BECKETT

In 2001 the IOS was born. My friend and I, both keen amateur gardeners joined immediately. We did not know the treasure chest
that would be opened before us. Not just the name orchid, but magical musical names and glorious colours and markings.

As time passed I became friendly with other members and one of them gave me two minute plants with exotic names - a Cattleya
and a Paphiopediolum. As the years passed they grew, were repotted and settled happily on a windowsill. They were watered on
Sundays, never fed, but stroked and admired and then gave me the most wondrous flowers.

The Cattleya, with a flower as large as a dinner plate, white creamy petals, the Paphiopedilum, dainty, shy, hiding among its leaves -
a pouch and butterfly leaves of mauve and purple. They were breathtaking as they stood side by side. In 2012 the Paphiopedilum was
chosen as the best exhibit (not just orchids) in the local horticultural show.

They still flourish with loving care, admiration and gentle stroking of their petals - perhaps they will bloom again.

How beautiful you are my dear

Standing in your earthbound pot
Your petals large and gleaming
No sign of mark or spot
Proudly you stand
Head held high
Your creamy coloured hue
Entrancing, all inviting
Shining in the morning light
Oh Cattleya, how beautiful you are
To those who live with failing sight.

HYLDA J. BECKETT

The Irish Orchid Society Winter—Spring January to June 2018 [ 30 ]


Connecting a World of Orchids
orchidwire.com/index.html
Swiss Orchid Foundation
The Swiss Orchid Foundation is working
on a world orchid iconography
(orchid.unibas.ch) and has slides,
drawings and herbarium specimens from
over 13,000 different orchid species which
you may find here: orchid.unibas.ch/
iconography.search.php
BibliOrchidea
BibliOrchidea is with over 150,000 entries
the largest orchid literature database
worldwide.
orchid.unibas.ch/bibliorchidea/pages/
applet.php
An Geimhreadh - An tEarrach
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This adorable photo, which shows a cute
dormouse climbing up a yarrow flower in the
Italian mountains, won the Creatures of the
Land category in the 2017 Comedy Wildlife
Photography Awards.
The photographer, Andrea Zampatti, 32, from
Monticelli in Italy, took the photo while hiking
on Mount Guglielmo. He said: 'I was walking
along the track and I began to hear a sharp and
strange "call" coming from the edge of the
forest. After a few minutes of searching, with
amazement and happiness, I found this tiny
dormouse.
Athbhliain faoi shéan is
faoi mhaise daoibh
Volume 16, Issue One [ 31 ]
IN THIS ISSUE

03 Calendar
04 Editor’s Notes
05 The Hidden Memories of Plants
12 Strange New Orchid
14 New Orchid Genome
15 Extinctions?
16 Two Exciting Irish Discoveries
18 The Great Cymbidium Myth
19 Peter Stiller
20 Cypripedium hotei atsumorianum
21 Members Night - October 2, 2017
24 Book Review - The Orchid Hunter - UK
29 Gastrodia bambu
30 Hylda J. Beckett
31 Advertisements
32 Rear Cover - Variety of Orchid Seeds
Seed list: http://www.pollinia.org/seeds/