360 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1924 



There are now growing in the garden over 7,000 orchid plants, 

 representing about 400 species. Among these are many that have 

 never flowered, and will, when they blossom, furnish other species 

 records for Panama. Nearly all the plants are from Panama, the 

 only exceptions being some from other parts of tropical America 

 and a few from the Old World, which are grown for their handsome 

 flowers. The garden is a show place in Balboa, visited by many 

 tourists. Most orchids bloom for only a short period, but there 

 are always some in flower at any season of the year. Here in 

 Panama, as in all tropical regions, the great majority of orchids, 

 contrary to ill-informed popular belief, are plants with incon- 

 spicuous flowers, without interest to the casual observer. It is true 

 that most of these small flowers, even the tiniest, are strikingly hand- 

 some when viewed under a lens. Visitors about to inspect an orchid 

 garden generally anticipate lavish displays of brilliant color, and 

 are sometimes disappointed when faced with actualities, since even 

 in so large an assemblage of orchid plants, and at the most favor- 

 able season, the percentage of plants with showy flowers is surpris- 

 ingly small. For this reason it is desirable to cultivate some exotic 

 plants which can be depended upon to furnish quantities of showy 

 flowers, and thus satisfy those visitors who are interested more in 

 the superficial aspects of the collection than in its true scientific value. 



In order to accommodate the large variety of orchids occurring 

 naturally in Panama it is necessary to supply varied conditions for 

 their growth. Tropical orchids are divided into two classes, terres- 

 trial and epiphytic. The former grow in the ground, and in the 

 Tropics these are far less numerous than the epiphytic species. Of 

 terrestrial orchids there are two classes — those with green leaves and 

 stems, which behave like most other plants, and those which are 

 saprophytic, living wholly upon decaying plant matter. Saprophy- 

 tic orchids, which are not numerous anywhere, are easily recognized 

 by their lack of green coloration. 



By far the greater number of tropical orchids are epiphytic, 

 growing upon trunks or limbs of trees, and deriving nutriment 

 chiefly from decaying organic material that lodges about their 

 roots. They are often spoken of as parasites, but no orchids are 

 parasites, our only common representatives of that group being the 

 mistletoes. Epiphytic orchids are sometimes apparently terrestrial, 

 growing upon the ground in beds of mosses and other plants. 



In temperate regions all orchids are terrestrial. In the United 

 States epiphytic species are found only in Florida, except for a 

 few that extend farther west close to the Gulf coast. Florida has 

 a rather large number of epiphytic species, belonging to groups 

 that are represented also in Central America. It is worthy of 

 record here that in an orchid list published recently by Ames, about 



