"Gareth Wills" wrote in message ...
Many years ago when we lived in Buffalo, NY we grew bletilla outdoors in a
sandy patch near the foundation of the greenhouse. The only protection they
ever got was a snow mulch which was usually more than plentiful. The sand
was left over from the greenhouse construction and helped lighten the
fertile but very heavy brown clay. They grew as well as any of the iris,
peonies, phlox, etc and with less bother. Good luck
Gary

Hi Gary.

Thanks. I did a search on bletilla, in order to find some pictures,
and found this site: http://www.hardy-orchids.com/index.html (alas,
in my reply to Karen I confused this site with
http://www.thimblefarms.com/, which is the one I had intended to refer
to there).

Anyway, I found some of what is listed on
http://www.hardy-orchids.com/index.html a little odd, and that plants
that will do well in USDA zone 7 are listed as hardy. Don't the zone
numbers increase as you go south? Then, isn't zone 7 almost tropical?
But they do have a wide variety of orchids and other plants that
ought to do well here.

BTW, what species of bletilla did you grow?

Thanks again,

Ted