We have lots of amazing orchid species in flower at the moment and so our team of orchid growers are busy pollinating flowers to set seed capsules. Pollination is an exciting moment when every student starts to look forward to a greenhouse full of newly flowering seedlings of their favourite species. On average it takes […]

The festive season wouldn’t be complete without ‘Orchid Christmas’, our annual celebration of the previous year at the Writhlington Orchid Project. Orchid Christmas is a public evening event on Thursday 15th December running from 6.30pm until 9pm. There will be tours of the glasshouses (which are looking spectacular at the moment), short talks from students […]

Year 10 students at Writhlington have the challenge of sowing orchid seed in aseptic conditions. In this part of the OCR nationals course students must demonstrate the ability to work safely and maintain aseptic conditions for the orchid seed they sow on a nutrient agar. This year the seed is Stanhopea tigrina, a fantastic species […]

So after all the excitement of the vote Barkeria spectabilis came out a clear winner. The plant shown here is loving life in the new greenhouses where it lives in ‘Warm America’, the section devoted to species from south and central america and live at lower altitudes. Barkeria spectabilis is found in the wild in […]

Well it’s nearly Christmas so it is time to get going on those spring jobs in the greenhouse. The first job every spring for us is to repot the Pleiones and we will aim to have them all done by the middle of January.