March has arrived and we are surrounded by Cattleya species in flower and in bud.

The largest flowers belong to Cattleya schroderae with its enormous pale pink flowers, each with an orange/yellow disc on the lip and a particularly frilly look. I measured the flowers yesterday and the one at the front here was 25cm wide – wow! The species is another from Colombia, and it grows in warm lower montane forest.

We grow our plant in a basket of course bark,  hanging high in Warm Americas with the rest of our Cattleyas.

It joins cattleyas, amethystoglossa, coccinea, trianae alba (all below) in flower and those in bud will feature later this month – what a great genus!