Ok, so if you saw my Instagram story today, you saw a very cringe worthy video of me freaking the flip out about … a flower. BUT NOT JUST ANY FLOWER. A Calethea orbifolia flower! To be honest I didn’t know they could flower (well any comment sense should have told me DUH) but even if I thought about it, I wouldn’t have expected MY indoor orbifolia that has recently been infested with mealybug to flower.
All about that flower
The flower presents as a dainty white bloom, and if I hadn’t been doing a pest check on my plant I would’ve missed it completely. As it is, I think I caught it a day or two late so it isn’t at its best in my photos. Calatheas can flower in the wild, but it is less common for them to do so indoors. There are three changes that I made to my Orbifolia’s environment which might have contributed to the fact that it flowered: 1) I put it in my upstairs bathroom AKA my greenhouse with super super bright light. 2) I gave it, it’s first taste of a humidifier. 3) About a week prior I gave it a good dosage of Hydrogen Peroxide. BOOM BAM BOOM, a flower appeared. In any case, this tells me that despite recent pest visits to my plant, it is extremely happy.
I wonder if this means my plant is prone to flowering or if it was just particularly happy at the right point in time? In any case, I’ll be keeping a keen eye out from now on.