Phalaenopsis breeding

Development of phalaenopsis breeding

Standards - There has been significant advances in white breeding using Taiwanese and Japanese lines producing fantastic sprays with flower size, shape, arrangement. The best have been Cygnus and Taisuco Kaaladian that won several FCCs. Cygnus has perfect cascading arrangement and Taisuco Kaaladian good size and shape. Cygnus `Empire' AM/AOS has perfect shape and vigour producing 14 cm flowers and proven to produce consistent quality offspring when bred with Morning Moon another Japanese white. We are waiting to see the results of the breeding of Taisuco Kaaladian with our best selected Cygnus x Morning Moon. The ideal white will have large sparkling white flowers of round overlapped shape with flat flowers and minimal midrib cascading in perfect arrangement on long sprays.

Yellows - This is unquestionably the most difficult breeding line with infertility and fading yellows being the major problems. The major contributor to yellows comes from amboinensis. There is much contention about the correct specie parent in Golden Sands which I will not go into. Venosa was used intensively and resulted in some non-fading yellows like Taipei Gold 'Gold Star' which is the basis of modern yellow breeding today. However, most other venosa hybrids produced a white halo or centre, tended to fade and are small. Amboinensis used several times by back-crossing to keep the color has produced Brother Passat from Taiwan. However, the best was produced by the late Ralph Borders who used Golden Amboin x Hausermanns Gold Cup to produce the darkest yellow with red spotting. Golden Amboin is Golden Sands x Amboinensis and produced the First Class Certificate. However Golden Emperor `Sweet' FCC AOS a clear golden yellow with 4 inch flowers on a nice spray has proved unbeatable for over 2 decades. The AOS judges commented that it was a quantum leap forward in yellow breeding.

Currently the best good shaped clear yellow is Fullers Sunset `Golden Sun' that holds its yellow colour well is the second quantum leap foward in yellow breeding. There are a couple of other clones that hold the yellow colour well and some that fade. The pollen is infertile but breeds as pod parent.

Dark Purple Standards - The initial dark pinks/purples came from the German breeding lines of Zauberrot and Abendrot which were the best for sometime. King Shiang Beauty `CR' HCC AOS has proved to be an excellent parent when bred to reds intensifying the colour. When bred to Salu Peoker it produce nice carmine reds with good shape. These flowers are velvety and have proved their breeding potential in producing harlequin purple blacks and reds described in the following sections. A clone of Ruey Lih Beauty with perfect overlapped 11 cm velvety very dark flowers is unrivalled.

Reds - Reds cover the colour bands from purple to purple red, brick reds to the true reds. This is the most popular and sought after colour by hobbyists. Initial attempts to achieve this colors involved the species of leuddemania and bellina but when amboinensis was crossed to bellina, Princess Kaiulani produced the truest reds. Brother Purple 'Brother' has proven itself to be the most significant breakthrough in breeding larger and multi-floral reds like Brother Oconne. When Brother Purple was bred to Brother Fancy larger reds on spray flowers emerged the best being Brother Precious Stones. At a similar time there are also some extremely fine Sogo Cock hybrids which often produce double spikes.
My prediction that the best Golden Sun 'SL' a line bred solid red producing the finest reds has produced offspring beyond all expectations when bred with Leopard Prince `SL'. On a twelve inch leaf span plant it is capable of producing two spikes with twelve evenly spaced flowers on a first blooming plant with the roundest flowers. In the pictures shown these are the truest reds of good size and shape that holds the colour until the flower goes over. Most truer reds fade from the yellow parent(s) or change to purple over time. Another significant advance in non fading true reds is Leong Memoria Dorothy which is a selectrf solid red Sika Deer bred to Sogo John. These offspring have proved fertile as most reds are infertile and we look forward to the results of the mating of the best (Golden Sun x Leopard Prince) with the best Leong Memoria Dorothy and also to our advanced red breeding lines of King Shiang Beauty x Salu Peoker and Chingruey's Blood Red Sun x King Shiang Beauty with fuller shape.

Harlequins - Ever Spring Light Crown 3 was the first to achieve this color. This was achieved through the breeding of a mutated Golden Peoker 'Brother' mericlone called 'BL' which was bred to a dark purple called Taisuco Beauty. There were some Taiwan breeders trying to breed from the Ever Spring Prince lines to produce darker flowers. For the pot plant trade more breeding has been done with whites and pinks that have retained both the bold harlequin markings with the size and shape of overlapped whites. A good example of this is Chian Xen Mammon `CX112' that has excellent substance overlapped shape and flatness. The most recent intense harlequin that has high red pigmentation is Chain Xen Pearl x Lianher Glory where the flower is nearly 90 per cent solid. We are breeding our Golden Sun `SL' with this to produce the next generation of large reds. Chain Xen Pearl x Linher Glory is larger and considerably redder than Leopard Prince `SL'.

Multi-Floras - This is a line breeding involving compact plants with a short spike with many branches producing a profusion of flowers. Most of these tend to be white, pinks, light yellows and more recently some nice harlequins. Multiflora reds and dark yellows still continue to be elusive.

Spots - This started from the French breeding lines of Rousserole culminating in Smartissimo. In Taiwan Ho's French Fantasia breeding led to the Leopard Prince line which has produced considerably improved spots with deep pink/purple background. One clone of Spring Sunshing Spot has incredible flower count and the most bold intense blotches flowering almost throughout the year unlike most spots which are difficult to grow.

Blues - The natural violacea coeruleas and other coeruleas have been superseded by line bred blues which have significantly superior shape and colour achieved through the breeding violacea coerulea with the violacea Malaysia variety. We have been fortunate to acquire seedlings from the bluer crosses to flower a number of selected ones for further improving the blue colour. Violaceas are typically slow growing but in several crosses the vigour has been incredible outpacing standards and look forward to the flowering of these easy fast growing seedlings. Vigour is important in breeding selection.