Meetings

Phyllis PrestiaThis month, our guest speaker is POS member Phyllis Prestia.  She will discuss her trip to the World Orchid Conference, held last year in Johannesburg, South Africa.  

Phyllis will take us on a tour of the displays and orchids at the WOC, including those that received the highest awards at the conference. She will also discuss some of the orchids of the South African and Madagascar regions, which she saw and photographed.  Since Phyllis herself grows many of those species, her presentation will include details and tips on the culture of rainforest and savannah terrestrials.

Phyllis is a retired educator and middle school principal. She received a Doctorate of Education at Rutgers University, where she also served as instructor in the graduate education program.

Originally from New Jersey, she moved to California with her husband to retire in the sunny San Diego area and grow orchids. Her collection includes a variety of species and hybrids across several genera grown both in a small greenhouse as well as three outdoor growing areas under shade cloth.

In her orchid life Phyllis has been the president of the San Diego County Cymbidium Society and she currently serves as the vice-president of the Cymbidium Society of America.  She served as second vice-president for POS, as well as chairman of the annual auction committee for several years. She is active in several other Southern California orchid societies and is currently participating in the orchid judge training programs of both the American Orchid Society and Cymbidium Society of America.

Brandon TamThis month, our guest speaker is Brandon Tam, Orchid Collection Specialist at the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, CA.  The Huntington has one of the largest orchid collections in the United States with 16,000 plants.  Brandon will present an overview of the collection and discuss the Huntington’s involvement in the orchid world.  Then, he will present his 10 favorite orchids in the collection including their origins and growing culture.

Brandon has been with the Huntington for over 8 years.  He began volunteering at the institution at the age of 14.  There were always plenty of opportunities to quench his thirst for plant knowledge, from tending plants in the Conservatory to database entry of pressed specimens in the Herbarium. 

Brandon credits his grandmother for inspiring him to further his studies within the botanical world and pursue a career within that field.  She bought him his first orchid at age 7, a white flowering cymbidium. She would take him to their local nursery and let him pick out a plant on every visit.  Over time, his orchid collection grew, and his knowledge of orchids grew also.   Read more »

Alek ZaslawskiOur gust speaker this month is Alek Zaslawski of AWZ Orchids in Brazil. The topic of his presentation is the species Cattleya violacea and he will show plants in their natural habitat as well as flowers with different color forms. His talk will also include many cultivation tips.

Alek was born and raised in the state of Espirito Santo, in Southeastern Brazil. His father, Wladyslaw, grew orchids as a hobby, and Alek was always surrounded by orchids at his parents’ home.  His father enjoyed taking trips to see orchids in the wild and would take Alek with him.

Alek became a mechanical engineer and never expected to work with orchids, however, orchids would always catch his attention. He admired their beauty and the way they grew in nature. When his father retired, Alek quit his job to start an orchid business with him and in 1994 they opened AWZ Orchids.

Alek and his father were aware that orchids were quickly disappearing from the wild and their original idea was to reproduce plants in their nursery to help reduce the pressure on native populations. They also noticed that most of the plants that had been collected in the past had simply disappeared from collections. Typically, they had been killed or sold to foreign growers. Over the years, AWZ has tried to bring back some of the best varieties found within many species, especially those belonging to the Cattleya alliance.   Read more »

David BrownThis month we welcome David Brown as our guest speaker. David will present on "A Year at the San Diego Zoo Orchid Greenhouse" in which he will highlight those plants that typically flower in each month. 

The greenhouse at the San Diego Zoo is open to the public every third Friday of the month as part of the zoo's "Orchid Odyssey". David first attended that event in 1999, and became fascinated with the orchids in the zoo’s collection. "There was so much diversity in shape, size, color and form." he remembers. David came to see the greenhouse as one of the hidden jewel of the zoo and he returned every month after that. Eventually, he met Janette Gerrity, who is in charge of the orchid collection at the zoo. Janette began to mentor him in his new orchid obsession and David also came to know the volunteers who worked there and who shared their information and knowledge with him. After a few years, he knew enough about the orchid collection to become a volunteer himself. Upon a suggestion by other volunteers, he began to attend the meetings of the San Diego County Orchid Society and soon became an active member, later serving as a member of the board and, eventually, as President.

The orchid collection at the Zoo consists of about 3000 plants in 300 genera and 800 species. David especially favors the large species collection: "As pretty and intriguing as hybrids are, there is just something about species," he said. During his talk, he will share some of the zoo’s "impressive plants."