Hi Joanna,

If you give it time all will be revealed.
However if you are impatient the following might
help.

Flower buds are generally fatter so they should
feel 'thicker' in the growth.

You might be able to shine a torch behind the
growth and look through the leaves to see the
outline of the flower bud. The pigmentation on
P.malipoense might prove a bit of a problem as
this works better for the strap leafed plants.

Hope this helps.
Hope it is a flower.

Flower bud formation is not simply a factor of the
number of leaves.
With regards
Alan








"J Fortuna" wrote
in message news:ky32d.6786$lX.202@trnddc04...
How can one tell whether a Paph is starting a
new spike or growing a new
leaf?

The reason why I am asking is: I mail ordered a
Paph malipoense in-spike. It
got delivered today, with a note stating that it
is just starting a new
spike in the new growth. It looks like a new
leaf to me. But then I
remembered that my very first Paph also looked
like it was going to have a
new leaf before I left for vacation, and when I
came back it had a new
spike. So I am willing to accept that this _may_
be a new spike even though
it looks like a leaf ... But I would like to
know whether there is a way to
know for sure whether this is a spike or just
another leaf. Is there
something that I can look for to tell? Is this
something that people who
have been around Paphs long enough just know? Or
is it an educated guess,
based on the number of leaves for example?

What I would like to know in part is, whether or
not I may have been ripped
off, since the plant was sold to me as
"in-spike", and I may not have bought
it if it had been listed as "blooming size" but
not in spike. I am willing
to give it the benefit of a doubt that it may be
in spike, but it really
looks to me like it is just "in-leaf".

Joanna (who can already tell a Phal spike from
an aerial root very early on,
but alas still has much more to learn about
Paphs)