Stanhopea haselowiana

Being discovered by famous orchid collector, Joseph Warscewicz, a Lithuanian of Polish descent, who made several expeditions into Central and South America during period 1840 to 1850, stanhopea haselowiana to this day remains one of the beautiful and special desired stanhopea’s for any collector of these magical orchids. It was found by Warscewicz on the eastern slopes of the Andes, in wet mountain forests of Peru and as far as I know, for many many years stanhopea haselowiana was classified as nomen obscurum, i.e. no one could correctly classify it, since no more plants were collected of this specie for a very long time.

These days, stanhopea haselowiana seems to be seldom in cultivation and to see one in bloom gives me great enjoyment and delight.

My plant just finished its flowering season, this year it developed couple of flower spikes with four stunning flowers each. The flowers are very large in size, much larger than other stanhopea’s, pastel, very pale pink color with many darker shade pink spots and blotches all over the blooms and the scent is very complicated with many tones to it. The initial scent is a sweet, herbal mixture and then very strong, pleasant and penetrating smell of myrrh – an absolute delight!

Another gorgeous stanhopea to love and to admire and to marvel at Nature for creating such magical and special orchid.