Flower Feature - Bird of Paradise

Bird of paradise are a stunning orange flower with a touch of blue between. They are not common here in Canada, and definitely do not grow naturally, as they are native to South Africa. They were actually introduced to Hawaii, and not native to the islands as many would believe. If you are looking for something out of the ordinary - they are definitely a show-stopper!

When attached to the plant, bird of paradise open beautifully and bloom on their own as shown in the picture to the left. However, when they get cut and sent to us they come in and you cannot see any of the orange or blue petals. Those are hidden inside the hard green part that is angled to one side. While trying to research more for this blog post, I found A LOT of conflicting information as to what the parts of the bird of paradise are called (for example: some diagrams called the orange part sepals and the blue part petals. Other diagrams called the green angled part the sepal and the orange and blue both petals.) since I am not sure which is correct, I will just stick with calling the orange and blue both petals.

Now, to continue on after that aside: the orange and blue petals are hidden inside of the hard green top of the bird of paradise, which is a different texture than the stem. It opens up at the centre (where the petals come out from) with an overlap of thin green stem that you have to get your fingers underneath to "open" it and get access to the petals .You have to SLOWLY pull all of the petals out, section by section to open up the bird to get it to bloom, as I had to do for the birds in the photo above. They are often covered in a sap, which you can coat the petals with to keep them lasting longer and looking fresher. This sap would normally get spread naturally by the flower blooming on it's own, but it does not have the strength to do so without being attached to the plant. If you pull too hard or too fast when opening a bird of paradise, you can snap a whole section of petals off of the flower, making it look a lot less impressive. It can take anywhere from 30 seconds to 3 minutes to open a bird of paradise, depending on how much experience the florist has.

Now that you know all of the work that goes into opening a bird of paradise, is this arrangement a lot more unique?