442 



JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



NOTES ON SOME CURIOSITIES OF ORCHID 

 BREEDING. 



By Mr. C. C. Huest. 

 [Bead Oct. 12, 1897.] 

 During the past few years the number of Orchid hybrids raised 

 by hand has increased by leaps and bounds, and with this 

 increase have come numbers of curiosities and mysteries which 

 seem to baffle us at every turn. Fortunately during the same 

 period much light has been thrown on the actual details of 

 fertilisation, and my object in these notes is to put on record in 

 a concise form a few of these curiosities, and at the same time 

 to view them in the light of recent researches. A careful study 

 of these curiosities suggests the desirability of working through 

 the normal up to the abnormal, and you will perhaps pardon me 

 if before dealing with the extraordinary I give you a brief out- 

 line of the ordinary facts of hybridisation, and then I think we 

 shall be better able to deal with " Some Curiosities of Orchid 

 Breeding." 



Hybrids of the First Generation. 



Hybrids between two distinct species of Orchids are generally 

 intermediate in character between their two parents, and usually 

 are so intermediate as to be quite distinct from either. 



For instance, the well-known garden hybrid Cypripedium 

 x Leeanum is fairly intermediate between its two parents, 

 C. Spicerianum and C. insigne, so much so that it is quite 

 distinct from either. 



Sometimes one part of a hybrid appears to resemble one 

 paient more than the other ; for instance, in C. x Leeanum the 

 upper sepal of the flower outwardly seems to resemble C. 

 Spicerianum more than C. insigne ; while, on the other hand, 

 the staminode of the flower and the leaves and general habit of 

 the hybrid appear to incline towards C. insigne rather than 

 C. Spicerianum. 



Yet Professor Macfarlane, of the University of Pennsylvania, 

 Philadelphia, U.S.A., who has carefully worked out the minute 

 structure of this hybrid, found that even these parts were fairly 

 intermediate in character, though it was not so apparent to the 

 naked eye. (" Minute Structure of Plant Hybrids," Trans. Boy. 

 Soc. Edin. 1891, xxvii., Part I., No. 14, p. 246.) 



