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The present experiments were carried out to investigate the effects of low-temperature treatment in summer night on difficulties involved in the growth during the summer and accelerating the flowering of potted cymbidium plants. In order to attain the earlier shipment of cymbidium, the plants were treated with low night temperatures of either 13, 17, or 21℃, for 12 hours a day from 18:00 to 06:00, for 60 days during the period from July 23 to September 20. Cymbidium ´Tropical Yellow´, the early flowering cultivar, which was treated at 13℃, produced the inflorescence 20 days and flowered 25 days earlier, and Cymbidium ´Moon Venus´, the intermediate flowering cultivar, produced the inflorescence 22 days and flowered 25 days earlier than those grown without the low temperature. Cymbidium ´Lapin Hat´, the late flowering cultivar, however, did not show such earlier flowering with the similar treatment. When Cymbidium ´Anna´, the very sensitive cultivar to soft-rot, was treated with low temperatures, rate of the soft-rot incidents was much reduced. In case of the low temperature treatment for daily nights, it was possible to attain a month earlier shipment of potted cymbidium orchids due to earlier flowering, and this revealed the fact that marketing benefits are much greater with the operation than without.
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