Expanding our range in South America Week comes this tiny miniature with a rather a long name. Although the name schmidchenii reminds us of the word smidgen, meaning little bit of something – how appropriate! Platystele schmidchenii is native to wet forests from Peru to Colombia from 1000 to 2400m altitude and is rather extraordinary […]

Another of the orchids being filmed for the BBC’s Green Planet is the largest flowering of our Maxillarias, Maxillaria triloris. The buds are dramnatic as well as the flowers so it should be fantastic in time lapse. Maxillaria triloris is a native of South America (it is South America Week) and found from Venezuela to […]

Five year 11 students from The Mendip Studio School, Radstock, have been announced as finalists in The Amazon Longitude Explorer prize, a national innovation competition. The students, Ed, Amalia, Alex, Joe and Otto have entered their idea for developing electronics and environmental education, based on schools in tropical habitats and the use of Raspberry Pi […]

One of the plants we have sent to the BBC for the Green Planet series is this wonderful large growing species from Ecuador. (Another South American country ticked off our list for South Americas Week) This species is native to warm forests and we have seen similar Acinetia species in Costa Rica growing as massive […]

Another busy day in the school greenhouse included dividing Coelogyne cristata, sending more plants to the BBC film team for the forthcoming Green Planet series and finding plants to restock our online shop