Having just returned from a two week trip to the Sikkim Himalaya I can’t help but notice the wonderful Himalayan orchids flowering in the Writhlington Orchid Project greenhouses. I feel that one of the best things about growing exotic plants in a greenhouse is the way it transports you to the world’s most exciting habitats.

May is here and the top tip from Writhlington is get out into the countryside and find yourself some British orchids to admire. At the moment you could find Early spider orchid like the one above flowering at Dancing Ledge in Dorset last weekend, Green Winged orchid and early purple orchid. (go to read more […]

One of the most popular tasks at Writhlington is pollinating plants to produce seed to use in the orchid laboratory. We produce most of our seed this way which means that we can be absolutely sure that seedlings are the correct species and keep photographs of the parent plants. The job of pollination goes the […]

At Writhlington school we always feel that spring has arrived when our plants of Coelogyne cristata start to flower. Matt isn’t the tallest member of greenhouse club but he still shows the scale of this magnificent plant. Coelogyne cristata featured as one of our favourite orchids in an earlier blog and I am sure you […]

Spring is the best time of year to repot and split orchids and at Writhlington spring starts early. One plant that needed drastic attention was this old plant of Odontoglossum cristatum. A lovely cool growing species from Colombia. It has been growing on the same piece of cork bark for about seven years and it […]