Meet brassavolas: a new look at the lady-of-the-night and its hybrids

摘要

Chances are, Dr. Antoniomusa Brasavole never saw the Brassavola orchid that Scottish physician and botanist Dr. Robert Brown named in his honor in the ycar 1813. The cponymous Brasavole probably never left Ferrara, Italy, where he was born in the 17th century. Yet, as a botanist, he specialized in medicinal plants. And if one of these Brassavolu ladics of the night had wafted her intoxicating scent his way, he would certainly have exclaimed "Bellissima!" And Bellissima is how more and more of today's sphisticated orchidists describc the 15 or so specics (taxonomists differ on the exaetnumber)of this New World genus and its extraordinary hybrids. The awards records of the past decade reveal that when Brassavolu genes are mixed with more-mainstream Cattleya hybrids, great things happen.