Coelogyne barbata

This is one of our most spectacular Coelogyne species with multi-flowered spikes up to 1m long and large flowers. The flowers are really spectacular and the species is very well named as the bearded Coelogyne. Our clone is a particularly large growing one and has five flower spikes that will be flowering until December.

The dark brown ‘beard’ on the lip is probably an evolutionary adaption to limit access to just one species of bee to increase the chances of successful cross pollination.

The species is native to wet evergreen monsoon forest from Nepal to Southern China. We haven’t seen this species in Sikkim but we have visited the habitat (1000-1800m) where Coelogynes are abundant and we replicate the habitat in our Himalayan Greenhouse where plants are kept cool (min 7C) and really wet during the summer. We keep plants watered in winter too as the species produces its new growths as the flowers open from the old growths.