Can I grow an orchid from seed and how long would it take?

Anybody ever grow an orchid from seed?

• Is it possible to do this? cause i heard the seeds are very very tiny.How successful were you? Approx. how long did it take for the flower to start blooming?Thanks.

• Answer:

  Well, yes it's possible but growing orchids from seed is not something to casually undertake. The seed size varies by genus but often they're more the size of spores or dust than the size of what you might think of as seeds. Most orchid species also require very specific growing mediums to sprout; there are many that have still not been successfully grown artificially. Orchid seeds don't contain nutrient like normal seeds (one of the reasons they are so small). Also, orchids depend on their roots being colonized by extremely specific type of fungus, which they then form a symbiotic relationship with. In the wild orchids produce thousands or even millions of seeds in the hope that a few of them find just the right spot (this is also one of the reasons there are so many different types of orchids). This all makes growing them artificially quite difficult; usually they are grown in sterile rooms in specialized paste and the seeds are applied with a fine tipped paint brush or similar tool. What's more, most orchid species take a very long time to mature. Often they won't even look much like an orchid until they are 5+ years old and some species can take more than 10 years before they are ready to bloom. Mostly the only people who grow orchids from seed are those who sell them commercially and the occasional orchid hobbyist who really want to try breeding their own hybrids. As a side note: it is much easier to divide orchids, if you want to try fiddling around with them.