Our specimen plant of Epidendrum parkinsonianum is looking truly wonderful this week (just in time for Paris)

It is a species we are particularly fond of since finding it in the volcanic mountains of Costa Rica where it grows at around 1200m altitude hanging on the trunks and main branches of trees near rivers. This habitat surprised us as we had assumed from the thick leaves that it needs a dry bright environment. Moving the plant into cool shady conditions in our Cool Americas section (minimum 12C) in 2007 has resulted in much better growth and heavy flowering. We keep the plant damp throughout the year.

Last year the plant won a CCC at the London Orchid Show (see photo below) when it looked magnificent with nine enormous flowers – this year it has 14!