| ae fe RT Re. SG aE cn ee 8 eee 
-here very little progress has been mad 
Sept.-OctT., 1919.] THE ORCHID REVIEW 147 
cay) RIVATIVES. [SS 
RSQ] caTTLeYA MENDELI AND ITS DERIVATIVES. PS 
—— 
yw recently looking at a fine form of Cattleya armainvillierensis, a 
hybrid from C. Mendelii and Co Wy iczii, we thought of 
Girtner’s curious expetiment of changing one species into another by 
hybridisation, and wondered how soon it could be effected in the case of 
such an Orchid. The form the experiment would naturally take would be 
to cross C. Warscewiczii with the pollen of C. Mendelii, yielding C. 
armainvillierensis, re-crossing this with C. Mendelii, and continuing the 
process with each resulting hybrid until the metamorphosis was complete. 
The experiment is possible, because we know that such hybrids are fertile, 
but it would be a long one, for several generations would be necessary, and 
each of them would take several years to complete. The practical part of 
~ such an experiment would be to get a plant having the essential qualities of 
C. Mendelii, with possibly an improved constitution, and for this the main 
point is to get C. Mendelii on both sides of the ancestry. In this sense we 
may be said to have reached the third stage of the experiment, for there are 
ndelii that have been re-crossed by 
now six secondary hybrids of C. Me 
hird crossing may already have been 
itself, ana possibly in some of them at 
effected. They are as follows :— 
C: Mendelii x Warscewiczii = C. armainvillierensis; recrossed C. 
Mendelii = C. Baronne Edmond de Rothschild. 
C. M. X Lawrenceana = C. Murrayi; recrossed C. M. = C. oakwood- 
iensis. 
C.M. x Lelia cinnabarina = Leliocattley 
Lc. Czarita. 
C. M. x L. purpurata = Le. 
Juan. 
C. M. X L. tenebrosa = Le. Acis ; 
C. M. x Brassavola Digbyana = Brassoca 
C. M. = Brassocattleya Aida. 
The six secondary hybrids mentioned int 
presumably already three-fourths C. Mendelii, 
the same direction conld be effected by continuing 
desired result was obtained, or until the reversion was complete. 
A similar analysis of the hybrids of Cattleya Dowiana was made three 
years ago (O.R., xxiv. pPp- 213-216), and showed no fewer than twenty 
hybrids, involving four genera, in which the same stage had been reached, 
the object being to restore the beautiful yellow colour of that species, and 
: e owing to the dominance of the 
a Lucia; recrossed C. M. = 
Aphrodite ; recrossed C. M. = Lc. San 
recrossed C. M. = Le. gloriosa. 
ttleya Maronii; recrossed 
he right-hand column are thus 
and any further progress in 
the process until the 
