Roses are prim — orchids, dead-sexy.
I suspect that more people than not consider roses to be the world’s most popular garden plant; in temperate regions, that is. There was a time —and a very long period of time — when I was utterly uninterested in roses. To my untutored mind, what constituted a rose was limited to ‘hybrid tea’ varieties, as these were the height of fashion then and dominated suburban and public garden rose plantings in Adelaide, as elsewhere in southern Australia. Hybrid teas still give other types — damask, floribunda, gallica, and bourbon, to name a few — a run for their money, but these days, in Australia, there is a far greater variety of roses available to suburban gardeners compared with what was popular prior to the 1980s.
In my early thirties my dearest friend introduced me to roses created by the late and great David CH Austin, and only then was my interest piqued. With reliable, often intense fragrances (the frequent absence of which was a criticism of many hybrid teas); mostly old-fashioned many-petalled blooms; a broad range of colours; repeat flowering — not to mention romantic names like Sceptr’d Isle, The Lark Ascending, A Shropshire lad (a favourite), Open Arms, and The Generous Gardener — what is there about them not to like?
As desirable as Austins are, from Adelaide to Port Huon and Melbourne to Dunedin, I’ve seen very few grow with much in the way of the vigour of other rose types. Perhaps they’re only ever at their best in English climes? Austin himself referred to his creations as ‘English roses’. Almost certainly, growing them in Townsville would be a wasted effort. Rose breeders, nonetheless, continue honing hybridising techniques to create varieties claimed to be able to weather the tropics. Despite all their efforts, however, I remain unconvinced that the two can mix, and am very much of the opinion that they oughtn’t. Roses are simply too delicate for this climate. They’re too prim and therefore improper here. If it’s not the sun that’s too intense, it’s the humidity, or the heat, or the rain. Though it’s a fact that some varieties can grow in parts of the tropics — which is all well and good for one-eyed devotees — of all the roses I’ve seen in Townsville and as far north as Cairns, none appear to thrive.
There’s an altogether anachronistic-looking rose garden located within Townsville’s Queens Gardens (no apostrophe, despite being named in honour of Her then Royal Highness, Victoria Regina), with deep raised beds for much needed drainage. Whenever I visit there, however, its plants appear on the poor side of lacklustre either because of the climate, subpar horticultural practices, or both. And of those I’ve seen flowering from time-to-time, none exude a fragrance worth committing to memory. As a close friend declared many years ago by way of a rhetorical question, “Without scent, what is the point of a rose?” Indeed. The tropics remain effectively off-limits to most roses; certainly so in the lowland areas I’m familiar with, though I welcome robust evidence to the contrary. Perhaps they thrive at higher altitude cooler places like Atherton and Mareeba?
Fortunately, for gardeners on Australia’s east coast who live well north of the Tropic of Capricorn, there’s a group of flowering plants mostly adapted to the prevailing climate, which can elicit the same fervour as is oft bestowed roses. Orchids. Those from the tropics, that is — there’d be no point in growing the petite Purple waxlip orchid (Glossodia major) here, other than to prove that it wouldn’t survive. That species does, however, grow in South Eastern Queensland. Having recently attended the Townsville Orchid Society’s annual Spring Show, I can attest to the great variety in orchid flower shape (delightful and sensuous to grotesque), size (little-fingernail to outstretched hand), colour (dull to outrageously garish), and scent (absent or subtle to heady, while others best be avoided). The Society also presents annual Winter and Autumn shows. I assume that too few orchids flower in Townsville’s wet and humid summers to host shows then. Although, given that some twenty-eight thousand species of orchid are known to inhabit our planet — and so surely some from the tropics must flower in wet seasons? — I wouldn’t be surprised if there was some other perfectly acceptable reason for the absence of a summer show. Human fatigue?
There’s no other plant family I can think of with a range of species that flower in North Queensland over at least three meteorological seasons. Incidentally, along with Russia, Australia is one of just a few outlier nations that prefers to reckon the seasons meteorologically, as opposed to astronomically.
In this part of the world, orchids are understandably popular. Such is the adoration showered upon them that should one be discontent with the plants displayed and sold at Townsville’s annual Spring Show, a week later they can travel by road an hour north to Ingham for the annual Herbert River Orchid and Allied Plants Spring Show (it’s a bit of a mouthful, isn’t it?). Given their popularity and North Queensland’s amenable climate, it seems odd to me that a not insubstantial part of Townsville’s Queens Gardens is dedicated to roses, while — as far as I can determine — there’s nothing remotely similar in scale for orchids. Townsville’s sister city, Port Moresby, hosts Papua New Guinea’s National Orchid Garden — and a fine display it is — but I’m almost certain there’s no Australian corollary. Surely Townsville would be the ideal city for such?
My disinclination toward floristic flamboyance in all plants extends to orchids, though it has been known to lapse on occasion — whenever it suits, in fact. At their most impressive, some blooms appear voluptuous to the point of obscenity. The Cattleya in both form and colour ranges from chintzy to lurid. Baroquely patterned Phalænopsis do little for me — far too flashy. Oncidiums, on the other hand, while frequently colourful, tend toward the unremarkable. And so many of them are yellow, which I find a difficult colour in Australian gardens, which are bright enough as they are. Paphiopedilums, it must be said, appear too intriguingly alien and other-worldly to be as casually dismissed. I suspect most people won’t share these perspectives, which is fine. I wouldn’t offer them otherwise. We all have our points of view.
As with all plants destined for my garden, among orchids I’m almost exclusively drawn to species and natural hybrids, as opposed to selectively bred hybrids and cultivars. Among species, only those native to Queensland will do, and with few exceptions I look more favourably upon orchids indigenous to North and Far North Queensland. They needn’t be endemic, although that category too is looked upon approvingly. Currently growing in my backyard are potted Bottlebrush orchid (Dendrobium smillieæ), the flower heads of which resemble more a hyacinth than bottlebrush; Purple ground orchid (Spathoglottis plicata); Golden orchid (Dendrobium discolor); and Swamp orchid (Phaius australis).
Of these, the last is endangered, and grows farthest from Townsville near Cardwell and northward. Its flowers are, in my opinion, the fanciest of the four, though ‘fancy’ is not an adjective one is usually given to describe flowers of any kind of native plant if one happens to be Australian that is, and a male of the species. And why not? To hell with it — fancy it is! I’d never have thought to place the colours pink and brown aside each other, which is completely understandable given my inability to visualise such things. And yet the juxtaposition (a noun frequently overused, but I think apposite here), is far from displeasing. Nature, the great stylist.
For the better part of a year I’ve searched high and low for a commercial source of the Black orchid (Cymbidium canaliculatum). Of course, as I’ve come to expect from the common names of so many Australian plants, no part of it is black. Nor is it a plant that’s particularly difficult to come by as I’ve seen a few rather fine specimens at recent orchid shows. It’s just that I’ve not found any plants available for immediate purchase other than online where prices are depressingly extravagant.
With so much natural colour variation in its flowers, the orchid has many other common names, but my preference is for the Black orchid which, although strictly inaccurate, reasonably describes variations with dark colours. Yesterday I thought I’d happened upon one at the Herbert River show in Ingham, only to learn from its vendor that what had caught my eye was a selectively bred hybrid between C. canaliculatum and another native, the rather awkwardly named Grassy boat-lip orchid (C. suave). It is a particularly handsome orchid with fifty or so petite flowers to each raceme, which, in sunshine glow a bright blood red, and in shade appear a light Beaujolais.
Dino, the vendor (not his real name, but nonetheless befitting) explained that although at first glance the resulting cross appears identical to C. canaliculatum (on closer inspection, its leaves seem a little longer and broader), it benefits from genes inherited from C. suave. He reasoned that since the latter tends to grow in areas receiving higher rainfall, and the former has evolved to grow in climates with long dry seasons (often suffering in cultivation from over-watering), the hybrid is a superior alternative to the species. It is, for all intents and purposes, a more robust Black orchid imposter.
Having — until such time as our discussion — remained stubbornly unreceptive to the idea of growing selectively bred hybrid and cultivar native plants, I deferred to Dino’s perfectly reasoned rationale and purchased there and, and with no small measure of glee, the only plant he had on offer. At one third the price of the least expensive non-hybrids online, it was also a far more affordable option. Though I was oblivious to it at the time, a friend with whom I travelled to Ingham later commented that I appeared wholly determined to ensure that no one else should leave Conroy Hall with that plant in hand. Such is the passion orchids arouse.
If I were a betting man, I’d wager that anyone who, for the first time, successfully grows an orchid to flower would be hard-pressed not to want to replicate their success with at least another. So irresistible can their allure be that some gardeners surrender all else in the plant world in sole service to the exotic and somewhat erotic charm of orchids. If you’re wondering why ‘erotic’, please consider first that all flowers are sexual organs, and then the appearance and etymology of an orchid flower’s labellum (its third petal) and some parts of the human vulva.
Having grown orchids since I was a teen, I’ve thus far successfully navigated away from any road that leads straight toward orchid-fever. I wonder now, however, whether I can stay the course while living under a climate that favours some of the most ostentatious expressions of orchid flowers imaginable. Indeed, I should like to try my hand at growing other orchids, namely: the Brown tea-tree orchid (Cepobaculum canaliculatum); Cooktown orchid (Dendrobium superbum); Moth orchid (Phalænopsis amabilis subsp. rosenstromii); Fairy bells (Sarchochilus ceciliæ); Rainforest orchid (Dendrobium speciosum subsp. curvicaule); and Native strap orchid (Vanda hindsii).
I shall avoid any long-winded rationales for wanting to grow these, suffice to say that they’re not always limited to the appearance of their flowers. The Phalænopsis and Vanda are, for example, the only known representatives of their genus native to Australia, and I harbour a long-held curiosity toward them. They and the Sarchochilus — the type specimen of which was collected from Townsville’s Castle Hill — also have reputations for being temperamental in cultivation. Nonetheless, I welcome a challenge. I want to grow the Rainforest orchid because like all Rock orchids (of which it is a subspecies) it’s particularly floriferous (up to forty-five flowers per stem), and its leaves can remain on the plant for up to twelve years, which is, I think, quite astounding.
Veering away from orchids, I wish to assure anyone who might struggle with pronouncing Latin names that they are not alone. It is largely a dead language and, consequently, pronunciation of its more difficult words can only be guessed at by all but the most ardent scholar — of whom, I imagine, there are few. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t encounter difficulty to some degree or other in this regard, including expert botanists and taxonomists. People whose first language borrows from Latin — most Western Europeans and some descendants thereof— are distinctly advantaged.
For others, however, it can often prove more sticky. I recently watched a video of someone presenting instructions for transplanting epiphytic Staghorn ferns (Platycerium superbum) to larger backboards. For many, the plant is perhaps the most elegantly formed species of the genus. Indeed, in appearance, it might well be the most superb of all eighteen known (four of which are native to Australia). Unexpectedly, and without the faintest hint of play, the presenter repeatedly mispronounced the species as super-bum, rather than superb-um. Perhaps the less said about that, the better.
To be continued…
