Everybody Ought To Have a Maid and a Restrepia

Free flowering, compact, easy to grow, and cute flowers. What more could you ask for in an orchid? Hard to imagine that this is an orchid, but it is. Restrepia brachypus hails from Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Colombia in wet montane forests. It prefers high humidity and intermediate to cool temperatures (52°F min. to 80°F max.) year round. Keep it evenly moist (3 to 5 waterings per week) and give it bright indirect light, i.e., no direct sunlight. Fertilize once a month at quarter strength. Too much fertilizer yields lush foliage with no flowers. A friend of mine grows hers in a unique way. She places the plant (potted in small clay pot) in a plastic bag with moist sphagnum moss to provide the humidity. This species can be propagated by leaf cuttings from a previously flowered leaf. Photo courtesy of Andy's Orchids.