g'day jim,
it grows easily over here in the sub-tropics on the east coast of northern australia. but growing the orchid and enjoying the aroma of the vanilla pods in your kitchen is a long way in between.
the plant itself is nothing spectacular, the flowers are nothing spectacular and have no discernable aroma, generaly being a greenish colour that almost matches the vine.
you will need to learn how to hand pollinate the blooms, this includes doing it in the correct time frame on the day, so far and i'm only talking of me i haven't successfully hand pollinated. but then i'm only doing hit and miss affair.
if you do get successfull pollination then there is still a long way to go to get that vanilla you speak of, the bean takes about 12 months to mature then there is a somewhat drawn out process to turn it into useable end product.
i like the pant because it is unusual and not that easily come by over here.
so go buy some and have fun, if you can try to learn what you can about hand pollinating.
len
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