Helge W.'s posts

Gary Yong GeeOur May 4th Zoom General Meeting will feature Gary Yong Gee who will speak on ‘Epiphytic and Lithophytic Orchids of Southeast Queensland'. Gary's talk will feature the species that grow wild close to Gary’s home city of Brisbane. Some genera which you may be familiar with will be Cymbidium, Dendrobium, and Sarcochilus. An understanding of the habitat where these species grow will provide an insight into how to better cultivate them at home. Gary Yong Gee is an Australian born Chinese and lives in Brisbane, Australia. He began growing orchids about 40 years ago. These days he maintains a large hobby greenhouse where he cultivates Australian native and exotic species. He has over 100,000 orchid photographs taken on travels to parts of Australia, New Guinea, Asia, Europe, Central and South America, South Africa, and Madagascar both at shows and in situ. Gary is a judge with the Australian Orchid Council. He is also a member of several Australian orchid societies, the American Orchid Society, and the Orchid Conservation Alliance. Gary’s main interest are species orchids. He has contributed comprehensive monthly articles to the Orchid Species Bulletin, which is published by the Orchid Species Society for over 30 years. Gary has also written occasional articles for Orchids Australia as well as the Australian Orchid Review and he has given numerous talks to various orchid societies. His website showing some of his photographs is at www.yonggee.name.

Glen DeckerOur April 6th, 7:30 pm, Zoom General Meeting will feature Glen Decker who will speak on ‘My Life with Slippers’. Slipper orchids, including Paphiopedilums and Phragmipediums, are orchids that many of us envy but sometimes can find challenging to maintain. Glen Decker will take us on a journey to see slipper orchids around the world, including Peru, Ecuador, and throughout travel, culture, as well as stories about the people who share his obsession with slipper orchids. Glen has been growing orchids for over 40 years and holds the degree of Associate in Applied Science in Ornamental Horticulture. He is very active in the orchid community and was the owner of Piping Rock Orchids in New York. He also has been a Director of the Orchid Digest Corporation, and Chair of the AOS Publications committee. Glen has won numerous AOS quality and culture awards, including the Butterworth Prize for most outstanding culture of any orchid, the W. W. Wilson Award for most out-standing Cypripedium alliance plant, the Herbert Hager Award for most outstanding Phalaenopsis genus plant, the Carlyle A. Luer Award for most outstanding Pleurothallid alliance plant and the Nax Botanical Trophy for most outstanding species orchid. Glen has appeared in Martha Stewart's Better Living Magazine and on a PBS TV special "Orchid Delirium". He rewrote the Slipper section of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden's "The Best Orchids for Indoors", and he was technical editor for the "Orchids for Dummies" book.   Read more »

Dr. Courtney HackneyOur joint Zoom meeting on Tuesday, February 2nd will feature Courtney Hackney, Ph.D. from Jacksonville, Florida. Because Dr. Hackney is located on the East coast, his presentation will start at 7:30 pm. Please log in on time to catch his talk, which will be followed by our virtual plant forum around 8:30 pm. 

Dr. Hackney will discuss the major lineages found in today’s Cattleya hybrids. In his talk, he will trace breeding trends and specific clones which have contributed to some of the best-known hybrids of today. His talk is based on the decade of research and interviews which went into his 2004 excellent book ‘American Cattleyas’, detailing in old photographs and new text how the modern cattleyas came to be. The book also contains useful insights about Cattleyas and Cattleya hybrids, how to grow them, and what to expect from modern hybrids.

Dr. Hackney is Emeritus Professor of Biology at North Florida University, and is a prolific author. Recently, he has been researching coerulea Cattleyas, culminating in an excellent article  in the November 2018 issue of ORCHIDS. Other useful columns on breeding and culture can be found on his website.

Courtney grows a variety of hybrids and species in Jacksonville, Florida, but his favorites are the great Cattleya hybrids. He has about 500 mature Cattleyas in his shade house, including some classic clones which appeared in collections over 100 years ago.

He makes 10 to 15 hybrids as well as sibling species crosses per year and periodically offers them for sale.

Hello POS Members and Friends,

Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year to everyone!! We hope all of you had a nice and safe Thanksgiving. This has been a difficult and challenging year for all of us. The COVID-19 pandemic has created havoc in our lives, our families, and all societies. It has disrupted nearly all facets of our daily life. With the recent surge in COVID cases across the nation and our dropping down to the purple stage in San Diego County, we should prepare for another challenging year. Like many of you, we miss seeing everyone's smiling faces and chatting with you at the meetings. Fortunately,  advances in vaccine development are looking encouraging as are the ongoing efforts to develop effective treatments for those affected by the virus, particularly at early stages. Let’s hope these advances are successful and make 2021 a better year than 2020.

We are not aware of any of our members coming down with COVID, however, we did experience a loss of one of our beloved members, Susan Johnston, to cancer on September 30th. We sincerely hope and pray that all of you remain safe and healthy for the upcoming year. We can’t predict when our in person meetings will resume, but it probably won’t be until late 2021 or early 2022.

POS and SDCOS will continue our joint Zoom meetings and culture classes, both of which have been very informative. We believe our members have enjoyed the programs and speakers that we sponsored. On January 5th 2021 one of our favorite speakers, Ron Parsons, will share with us  his new talk  on 'Rare & Oddities of the Orchid World'. It should be an exciting  talk so please mark your calendars accordingly.   Read more »

Our November 3rd Joint General POS/SDCOS Meeting will be at 7:30 pm. with our speaker, Ken Jacobson, who will talk about  the group of Brazilian orchids formerly known as the Oncidium crispum group and hybrids made from these orchids.  

The Onc. crispum complex includes Onc. praetextum, Onc. curtum and Onc. gravesianum and all are now referenced as synonyms of Onc. crispum, but are kept separate as the individuals have been know as separate species for years (Jay Pfahl, www.orchidspecies.com). 

To make matters even more complex, the genus of these species has been changed to Gomesa and Onc. crispum, itself, is now under the name Gomesa imperatoris-maximil- liani in the Orchid Wiz and Orchid Roots  databases.

In addition to the individual species and the direct descendants of those species, Ken will cover more complex hybrids derived from the species.  A fair amount of time will be spent discussing culture, and how these plants can be grown successfully in the California coastal areas.

Ken was first introduced to orchids by his uncle in the 1960’s and has been growing orchids for well over 50 years. His collection includes Cymbidiums, Oncidiums, Odontoglossums, Lycastes, Cattleyas, Laelias, Masdevallias and several other genera.

Ken and his wife, Amy, enjoy traveling to all areas of the world where orchids are grown, visiting the local growers, and seeing various species in the wild. Together, Amy and Ken have over 7000 orchids. Ken is a judge in the AOS judging program and the CSA judging program, and is currently an AOS trustee. Amy is a judge in the AOS judging program. This should be a very informative talk and we encourage all to join us. The Zoom link will be sent with the email announcing the newsletter and will be the same as last  month's link.