Not only do many hobbyists consider growing their orchids indoors under lights an acceptable alternative until warmer weather returns in the spring, but a substantial proportion find the more controlled conditions and relatively minor costs of operation sufficient inducement to grow many of their orchids under lights all year around (see REFERENCES, entries 1, 2 and 3). The large numbers of "under lights" hobbyists is ample evidence in itself that artificial light is a fruitful means of growing orchids. After growing orchids under lights, and some research into what others with much more experience have written and done, I can now say that I am convinced. What fluorescent lights lack in intensity, they can compensate for in daily light duration and in numbers. It was also hard to imagine sun-loving plants like orchids flowering under the relatively low light intensities of conventional fluorescent tubes. To me, the whole idea suggested scenes from those futuristic science-fiction movies in which space-colony pioneers grow plants under artificial "suns" for survival in the void of black space. The almost eerie gleam of fluorescent tubes seems far removed from the dynamic, natural environment in which orchids have evolved.
You may have some difficulty, as I did, accepting the fact that orchids can be grown successfully under artificial light.
While much has changed in the intervening 28 years, including the society's headquarters, the general message remains the same.
At that time, the Society was headquartered at Harvard University, hence the references to the Cambridge offices.
The following is an excerpt from an essay that first appeared in the American Orchid Society BULLETIN (what later became the current Orchids Magazine) in March 1981 the second in a many-part series on orchid growing for the beginner.
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