AOS Handbook on Judging and Exhibition, Tenth Edition.The general form of the flower is toward fullness and roundness. A circumscribed circle, drawn with the base of the column as the center, should touch the tips of the petals and sepals and the margin of the lip, while the flower should fill the greater proportion of the area of the circle. Sepals should arrange themselves almost in an equilateral triangle; the petals and lip should do likewise but inverted. Sepals should be broad and fill in the gap between the petals and the lip. Petals should be erect to slightly arched, broad and rounded, frilled, or undulated at the margins according to the variety. The lip should be proportionate to the petals with a rounded, flattened, symmetrical, and crisped or frilled trumpet or isthmus in accordance with its background; it should be closed toward the base and more or less rolled around the column. Brassocattleyas generally have lips larger than the petals. Most cattleyas, laelias and laeliocattleyas have lips slightly larger to slightly smaller than the petals, depending on the ancestral species used. The entire flower should be nearly flat when viewed from the side, the lip curving down and now jutting out at right angles to the plane of the petals and sepals. The size of the flower should be equal to or greater than the geometric mean of the size of the parents. The potential of the species in size may already have been established by fine forms discovered in their natural habitats. In bifoliate crosses, the size of the flowers and the width of the petals will be less than in pure Cattleya labiata crosses because of the differences in the species involved. Substance of a high degree is now standard through polyploid forms. Texture should be sparkling, crystalline, velvety or waxy Floriferousness is closely related to parental background and size of flowers. While cattleyas with one exceptional flower may be judged, labiata-type cattleyas should have two or more flowers to be considered. In crosses involving bifoliate cattleyas, several flowers would have to be produced to warrant consideration, depending on the ancestry involved. The stem should be strong and upright to display the flowers to their best advantage, so that one flower does not crowd and distort another. |
CONSIDERColor: Hue, clarity, intensity and any pattern or markings on sepals, petals or lip.Substance, texture, form. Number of flowers: The total number of flowers, buds and inflorescences on the plant. Arrangement of flowers on inflorescence. Indicate whether well spaced, well displayed, clustered, etc. BALANCE (overall size, and size and positioning of parts. |
How to MeasureOverall MeasurementThe overall measurement of a flower (sometimes called "the natural spread") is that measurement of the natural carriage of the flower in its maximum dimension without flattening or grooming. It is recorded in the horizontal and vertical directions. Dorsal sepal - width: The dimension with the sepal is flattened into a plane. Dorsal sepal - length: The dimension from the point of attachment to the tip along the central vein. Petal - width and length: Same as for dorsal sepal. Lip - width: The dimension when the lip is sufficiently flattened not to damage the flower. Lip - length: The dimension from the point of its attachment to the base of the column or column-foot to the tip (or to a line representing the outermost margin of the lip). Spur length is measured from its attachment to the tip. |