Solferino: Orchid Museum and Millennium Tree

An orchid close-up

The Orchid Garden of Solferino is home to 32 species of orchids that are on display as well as for sale in a nursery within the gardens.  A few blocks from the town square, we are greeted by Maria Dominguez Garcia, the niece of Gilberto, one of the brothers involved with the project.

A couple of the orchids growing out of branches and trunks

Most of the orchids flower between February and March, so today we're coming learn a bit more this diverse and beautiful family of plants which grows abundantly in the region.   There are more than 20,000 species of orchids, a family of flowering plants which are characterized by their tiny seeds, bilateral symmetry, downward facing flowers, and a lip-like petal that is different from the other petals of the flower.

One of the few flowering orchids

Flower detail - really beautiful

Entire books are dedicated to the topics of the relationship of orchids with their pollinators, which are usually attracted to specific fragrances or shapes/colors of the orchid's petals.  At Solferino's Orchid Garden, the gardeners rely upon in-vitro fertilization of the orchids, in order to maximize production and maintain quality.  Maria tells us that this is difficult given the equipment they have at the moment, and they are hoping to build a better laboratory space to expand their collection.  In addition, the garden has an orchid exchange with a group in nearby Nuevo Durango, to share specimens and growing techniques.

A sampling of the orchid plants for sale

Some white orchids

As we walk through the display of carefully labeled specimens, Maria points out a small bird's nest, filled with baby birds, built in the base of one plant.  Most of the orchids are growing on tree branches,  as they are epiphytes, like other mosses, bromeliads, and cacti, taking in their nutrients from the air, rain, and other sources, rather than the trees that they live in.

We found these stowaways in one plant

Another sight in the garden is two majestic trees.  The first, called the Millennium Tree, because of its estimated age, is a Enterolobium cyclocarpum, more commonly called the pich tree in Maya, Guanacaste tree in spanish, or the Elephant ear in english, because of the shape of its seed pods.  This pich tree is more than 100 feet tall, and is now protected after years of losing parts of its trunk and branches to locals who used it as lumber.

Standing in front of the Ceiba tree

Ceiba roots are huge!

Nearby, a Ceiba tree, nearly 700 years old, towers more than 110 feet in the air.  The Ceiba is the sacred tree of the Maya, who call it Yaxche, or the tree of life.  Its large roots and straight trunk lead to a large canopy of branches. Birds and butterflies flutter in the shadow of this magnificent tree while a egg-sized beetle scurries up its trunk.  This tree of life is flourishing in Solferino.

Orchids growing on pich tree