Looking Back at the Orchid Craze's Beginning

Orchid cultivation is so widespread nowadays that it is hard to picture a world without these wonderful flowers. However, not so very long ago, the people of the developed world were entirely ignorant of the vast majority of species of orchids.

Europeans of course were familiar with their native orchid types, such as the much acclaimed Bee Orchid. But familiarity with of the thousands of gorgeous tropical orchids had to wait on the results of explorations into the jungles and mountains of South America and the eastern Indies. Even then, specimens were slow to make it back to places such as England, Belgium or Spain.

Perhaps the first living orchid to find its way from the tropics to England was an Epidendrum cochleatum, one of the more showy of its family. It flowered in London in 1787. Another speciman from the same family was brought in to England in the year 1778. It took a decade for its caretakers to bring forth flowers from the plant.

Admiral William Bligh of Mutiny on the Bounty fame had a small part in laying the groundwork for the orchid fad. In the early 1790s he brought 15 species of epiphytal orchids to England from the West Indies. These were put on display at the famous Kew Gardens in London. For many years thereafter the West Indies, along with India, were the most important sources of tropical orchids to Europe. In 1793, however, a species of Oncidium was taken to England from Panama, followed a few years later by orchids from Uruguay.

By 1818, Brazil in partcular was contributing to what was becoming a steady flow of orchids back to England and other countries of Europe. By 1830 collectors were traveling throughout Brazil on behalf of the Royal Horticultural Society, on the lookout for never-before-seen orchid species.

The orchid exchange quickly became a serious profit making effort, with businessmen in Brazil negotiating agreements with their counterparts in London to send plants to England to be resold there. William Harrison, a merchant in Rio de Janeiro in the 1830s and 1840s, shipped many wonderful orchids to his brother Richard in Liverpool. Richard's house quickly became a Mecca for orchid lovers who pilgrimaged there to see the newest arrivals.

It was one thing to introduce orchids to Europe, but another thing completely to cultivate orchids succesfully. For more than half a century, England indeed was the graveyard for tropical orchids. The plants that survived did so in spite of rather than because of the treatment they received. Growers kept experimenting and making mistakes until, by about 1850, they had mostly worked out the art of orchid cultivation. That's when the orchid craze really took off, because now the knowledge was available by which even non-botanists could grow these stunning plants.

Knowledge of successfully growing orchids has greatly expanded during the intervening years and now we know so much more than did those Victorian devotees. We also have, of course, better technology to assist us in the greenhouse and garden.

The most up-to-date guide to expert orchid cultivation, in my opinion, is Orchid Care Expert by Nigel Howard, which can be downloaded online. Howard's wonderful guide constitutes a thorough education all by itself. And, you will find it suitable for beginners as well as more expeienced orchid growers. Also, be sure to visit the Orchid Secrets web site, which has a growing database of information on many topics of orchid cultivation.