Orchids, Dolphins and a Golden Retriever

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This is five-year-old Banner, who belongs to friends. We were hanging out on their patio waiting for dinner. Banner wanted food, too.

We visited an orchid farm a mile from our VRBO called Gallup & Stribling Orchids.

I found this information about the germination of orchids to be fascinating:

Fusing Horticulture & Technology

Gallup & Stribling Orchids has one of the largest plant tissue culture laboratories in the United States dedicated to orchid propagation. We provide full laboratory services to the hobbyist and commercial grower—domestically and internationally. Our investment in the laboratory has enabled us to maintain a scientifically pure and well-curated collection of beautiful orchids to share worldwide.

Fusing horticulture and technology in the laboratory has paved the way for hobbyist and commercial orchid production—Gallup & Stribling is proud to be at the forefront.

Laboratory services include orchid seed germination, cloning by mertistem-tissue culture of Cymbdium, Cattleya, and Oncidium orchids, replating of all orchid genera, and treatment for ploidy change.

https://www.gallup-stribling.com/laboratory/

Aren’t the orchids gorgeous?

We’ve been seeing lots of dolphins. Sunday morning there were dozens of dolphins. There were two types, which I’m trying to identify. Mostly the difference is the size and how they act. The “big” ones slowly swim through the ocean surfacing from time to time.

The smaller ones swim fast and leap into the air. I’ve looked up dolphins in Santa Barbara and I believe the two we’ve seen are Short-beaked Common Dolphins (the smaller sized). They are less than six feet in length and weigh up to 170 pounds.

Behavior and Diet

Short-beaked common dolphins are often active at the surface. These highly social, energetic dolphins commonly leap out of the water at high speeds, flip end-over-end, and somersault in the air. They will also swim alongside ships riding the bow for long periods of time. This “bow riding” behavior has even been observed alongside large whales.

https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/species/short-beaked-common-dolphin

The larger dolphins I believe are the Common Bottlenose Dolphins:

Common Bottlenose Dolphin

Common bottlenose dolphins are found throughout the world in both offshore and coastal waters, including harbors, bays, gulfs, and estuaries of temperate and tropical waters. They are one of the most well-studied marine mammals in the wild. In addition, they are easy to view in the wild because they live close to shore and are distributed throughout coastal and estuarine waters. 

Meet Our Cetaceans

I tried to video dolphins the other day and I accidentally clicked on Slo-Mo. You can try to watch the video, but if it’s too slow, I understand…Although it does speed up at the end.

https://videopress.com/v/VRgVqEU7?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true
Slo-Mo video of dolphins

What are your thoughts about orchids? Do you have any? Are you able to get them to bloom?

Did you know orchids can be produced in labs?

What are your thoughts about dolphins?

38 thoughts on “Orchids, Dolphins and a Golden Retriever”

  2. Wow, I love your video. They were so close in! And Banner — what a cute boy! Love all these wonderful experiences – and that I’m inferring that this trip truly is much more calm and relaxing than last year!

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  3. At first, I thought Banner has a Frisbee. A food bowl is ever better! What a sweetheart.

    I love orchids, but there’s tricky to keep alive, so I just admire from a distance nowadays.

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    • Banner is a cutie. They have a new puppy Madison, too, but I didn’t get a good photo. Orchids are difficult. My parents had a couple orchids that they bought at an orchid show. When they weren’t blooming they took them back to the orchid grower. My parents would get a call when they were back in bloom and pick them up.

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  6. No thoughts on orchids here, but I suspect just about anything we come into contact with in 2024 can be reproduced in a lab- perhaps even people.
    The kids and I swam with dolphins on a vacay in Hawaii. Very touristy but also very fun!

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  7. Those orchids are beautiful! I was given one years ago, but unfortunately, it didn’t survive. 😔
    I love dolphins, though I’ve heard they can be even more aggressive than sharks at times. It’s good to keep in mind since we often think of them as friendly and lovable.

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    • That’s so true. Dolphins do seem friendly and lovable. I’d be worried about the ones who grow up to be more than 500 lbs! If they ran into you, or jumped on you by accident that would not be good. I had an orchid that after the bloom died, I had the plant for years. But it never had flowers again.

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