October 2012 - Alex Nadzan

An Amateur’s Attempt at Orchid Hybridizing

Alex NadzanOctober’s speaker will be our own Alex Nadzan who has been collecting and growing orchids for over 20 years with emphasis on Cattleya, Oncidium and Cymbidium species and hybrids. Alex was first bitten by the orchid bug in the late 1980’s when he attended an orchid show at the Chicago Botanic Garden and purchased from Orchids by Hausermann, Inc. two orchids, a Cattleya and Oncidium, both of which he still owns and manages to bloom on a yearly basis.  His orchid collection, which now consists of a few thousand orchids, expanded after he and his family relocated to San Diego where conditions are favorable for growing outdoors compared to the Chicago area.  

Over the last 7 years, Alex has embarked on an orchid hybridizing program devoted primarily to creating novel, compact and cold-tolerant Cattleya hybrids.  He will discuss his attempts at producing new hybrids, providing an overview of orchid hybridization basics including pollination, seed production and germination, deflasking and raising orchid seedlings to blooming size. He also will show blooms of some of his first hybrids and share some of the novel hybrids in progress.

As part of his talk and in place of the culture class, Alex will demonstrate how to deflask and start out orchid seedlings for those members who may what to try their hand at it.

Alex is an active member of the Palomar Orchid Society having served as trustee and currently as 1st Vice President, responsible for POS speaker programs.  He is an organic chemist by training and, when not attending to his plants and his active grandchildren, he consults for the pharmaceutical and biotech industry in the areas of drug discovery and development.

The opportunity table will be supplied by Alex, including a few of his novel hybrids and supplemented with plants from Newman’s Orchids.