Introduction to the Characteristics and Care Methods of the Dalong Yanzhi Cymbidium goeringii Variety

Dalong Yanzhi was discovered in 1998 in Xiaotian Town, Shucheng, Anhui. It was dug up by local flower farmer Ban Dachao. In the spring of 1998, Hefei orchid enthusiast Gong Renhong went into the mountains and bought the entire orchid plant, and named it. Cymbidium goeringii, stamen-petal butterfly type, a famous variety.

The grass is bow-shaped and broad, with a vigorous and bold posture; the leaves are U-shaped, with sharp tips; the more central the leaf, the more obvious the floral characteristics on the leaf surface. New shoots are red. The fragrance is deep and long-lasting, the flower shape is large, the outer petals are lotus-shaped with heavy red coloring, the stamen petals are completely butterfly-transformed, with a white base, pure and clean white, bearing red patches, neat and brilliantly eye-catching! The texture is extremely strong! The lateral lobes are exceptionally plump. The column is also bright red. This flower is large, and the stamen petals undergo a color-changing process when blooming: when first opening, a green tinge can be seen on the white base, and the red patches are dark red, until at full bloom, when the lateral lobes enlarge, the green tinge disappears, and the red patches turn to bright crimson. The flower is auspicious and festive, exceptionally gorgeous.

The outer three petals of "Dalong Yanzhi" are lotus-shaped, with drooping shoulders; when withheld water at opening, the shoulders are slightly level. The outer three petals bear purplish-red tinges and purplish-red vein lines, and it readily produces double flowers. The flower stalk is about 20 cm tall, the flower is about 10 cm large, with a delicate fragrance. Three tongues are arranged in a whorl standing upright, and the purplish-red patches on the tongues are incomparably gorgeous, with the color patches distributed neatly and symmetrically, accounting for 90% of the tongue surface, and the purplish-red patches extend all the way to the base of the petals. Three days after the flower opens, the tips of a pair of stamen tongues curl slightly backward to form a harmonious inverted "pin" character central column, and one week later the white patches on the tongues gradually turn pink, and as the opening time lengthens, the pink areas gradually turn purplish-red. More than a month after the flower opens, the flower color turns nearly uniform.

The new leaves of "Dalong Yanzhi" are slanting-upright, and mature leaves are semi-drooping, sometimes with twisting. The leaf color is dark green, and the leaf surface is a shallow "V" shape. The leaves of mature grass are about 25 cm long, and exceptionally strong seedlings rarely have leaves of 30 cm. The leaves are 1-1.2 cm wide, with fine leaf margins and sharp leaf tips. Misaligned tips and fish-belly leaves sometimes appear. The leaf butterfly factor on the leaves is abundant, so the leaf butterfly variations are manifold: there are raised line butterflies, flat surface butterflies, transparent crystal butterflies, male-form emulsified butterflies, and lip-transformed butterflies on the central leaves. Leaf butterflies are mostly composed mainly of purplish-red mixed with a little crystal transparency and bright red patches. Line butterflies and flat surface butterflies do not scorch or fade in color even when old, while lip-transformed butterflies, emulsified butterflies, and crystal butterflies shrink, yellow, or scorch after the leaves mature.

The leaf buds and new shoots of "Dalong Yanzhi" are pale purplish-red or peach-red and translucent, with the bud body round and neat like a blunt bamboo shoot tip. After emerging from the soil, they show even greater diversity: some have purple sand-like dense lines, some are full of crystal, and some have colored tips.

Optimization phenomenon of "Dalong Yanzhi": the bud sheath changed from peach-red long soft bud sheaths in 2004 to dark purple short hard bud sheaths in 2005 and 2006. Dissection of flower buds in 2004 found that the petals had changed from being mixed with a little green at first to now consisting of only red and white. Dissection of flower buds in 2005 and 2006 showed the petals still consisted of red and white. The leaf butterfly expression is more abundant than before; previously it was strong in medium and weak grass, and now it is also very strong in strong grass.