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The Orchid Oracle

August 2019

Volume 5 Issue 8

Join JTOS On

We hope everybody enjoyed John’s Paphiopedilum presentation last month and the beautiful plants he brought for the raffle and sale. A special thank you for all members who participated with refreshments and plants to share with the club, keep them coming and participate in 2 extra raffles. We are sorry that Patrick can’t make it this Wednesday, he is always wel-comed, so I guess we will stay in the fog about the FOG a while long-er! Instead, Patrick has sent his replacement, from his area, who I am very excited to hear again and every chance I get, Mr. Jamie Lawson. He says he is not a pro, but I rank him way up there on the knowledge and experience with orchids scale. He will have an excellent program plus plants for sale and raffle.

YOU DON’T WANT TO MISS IT! CHECK OUT HIS BIO AND STORY OF HIS BLACK ORCHID!

see you Wednesday!

Weyman

And Post your

“blooming”

Pictures

Inside This Newsletter

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Speaker’s bio/story pg 2

August Growing Tips Pg 4

JTOS Directory Pg 6

JTOS Calendar Pg 7

Presidents Message

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Jamie Lawson Bio:

Jamie and Jackie Lawson with their kids, Brian and Lanie, settled in Central Florida in 1990 after a year traveling through Mexico and Central America in their motorhome. Having their interest piqued by the orchids they saw in the wild, they immediately bought a couple of orchids, took out the ugly white tags and went to their first Orchid Society meeting. Thus realizing they had a lot to learn.

Although Jamie is not an expert himself, he has traveled extensively to various growers, both commer-cial and backyard and picked their brains. He is also a member of 4 Orchid Societies which he regu-larly attends. Jamie is the Past President of the Vero Beach Orchid Society and past vice President of the Port St Lucie Orchid Society. He also has flasked thousands of orchid seeds at Hummingbird Highway Orchid Lab out of their cottage in Micco.

Jamie is interested in the Catasetinae and has made a few hybrids and is now doing mericlones of his awarded Catasetinae in the lab. The lecture will be on “The Idiosyncrasies of the Catasetinae.” Jamie also invites anyone interested in learning about Orchid breeding to visit the lab.

Thanks

Jamie

The Story of the Black Orchid

By Jamie Lawson

One day a few years ago, I was looking for some new orchids to buy. I came across an ad for a place in San Diego called Sunset Valley Orchids. He had some new crosses of orchids in the Catasetinae family. Now I liked Catasetum type orchids as they are so unusual. Catasetums themselves are one of the few orchids which are sexually dimorphic. This means they have male and female flowers as opposed to all the rest of the orchids having their reproductive

parts fused on the column.

Anyway, I ordered a bunch at $13 each. A couple of years later, one of them was ready to bloom. When it opened up, I looked at it hanging there and thought to myself, 'Wow that is really something!' Not only did it have a fantastic arrangement with the large fan shaped

leaves spread over the top like Cleopatra's fan but the blooms were black!

At the time, I was vice president of the Central Florida Orchid Society. I took the plant (which hadn't been named yet) to the meeting to show it off in the show and tell. It did have it's cross name which was (Mo. Painted Desert x Ctsm. Donna Wise). See the family tree on

the bottom of this page.

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Now, the Central Florida Society is very large and has a lot of orchid judges and other people who are recognized world wide for their orchid knowledge. One of these was Frank Smith of the Krull

Smith Nursery fame. Frank had over 673 awards for quality given to the orchids he had grown which was the most of anyone in the world! I saw him studying my orchid on the display table so

walked over to see what he had to say. He turned to me and said "Jamie is that your orchid?” When I said yes, he replied "Jamie, that is the most fantastic orchid I have ever seen. I will give

you anything in my greenhouse for that one back bulb there!"

I was very excited as Frank's collection of orchids is unmatched. I asked him if he meant including his private greenhouses next to his mansion which hardly anyone was allowed to enter. You have to realize that I was pretty much a beginner in orchids at the time and Frank was a World Class Orchidist with a huge nursery across the street from his home and about 8 private greenhouses

where he kept his private collection , including one with 8 air conditioners for the very rare cool growing orchids. Of course I said "Sure!"

As the meeting went on, I was introducing the featured speaker as that is what VPs of orchid soci-eties do. I was going to make a joke about Frank and the speaker as they always teased each oth-

er about their ages which actually didn't make much sense as the speaker was in his 80s and Frank, I thought, was in his early fifties. But I couldn't see Frank in the crowd so I said nothing and turned out the lights so the speaker could present his slide program. I stood up against the

wall during the talks so I could be by the light switch, so I was able to look over the crowd. I no-ticed some lights and that there were people out in the hallway with the lights. I thought to my-self that those guys were missing the program and what were they doing out there anyway. I no-ticed that they were all the judges in the society and it slowly dawned on me as I looked across

the room to where my orchid had been that it wasn't there anymore!

I remembered then that the central Florida group had always bragged that they had so many judg-es as members that they could hold official AOS judgings at the meeting. And they were judging my orchid! After the speaker's presentation, Frank came up to me and announced that my orchid had received an award of FCC/AOS. This is a First Class Certificate and very few orchids receive

this award. Then Frank asked me how much I thought that orchid was worth and I facetiously said "$10,000?" in a modest manner. Frank looked at me and nodded "Yes." Well, I was really excited

and took the plant home and put it in my greenhouse in a special spot as opposed to leaving it outside where it had grown up. Oh, by the way, this turned out to be a seminal cross by Fred

Clarke of Sunset Valley Orchids in San Diego, and it made him famous. Not only was it black but the blooms were also very long-lived - up to a month, as opposed to most of the Catasetinae tribe in which flowers typically lasted only 7 to 10 days. It was such a new combination of genera that Fred got to name a whole new genus to include it, which made him even more famous and now he

is a world renowned speaker traveling all over the world giving lectures.

And he always credits me with getting the first FCC on one of his black orchids.

When an orchid is awarded the owner gives it a special name as it has to be registered with the AOS, the American Orchid Society, and it needs a special clonal name to differentiate it from all

the other in this case Fdk After Darks. Since it was dark and mysterious and sultry looking, I named it after my daughter Juliana Marie. Thus it is named Fredclarkeara After Dark 'Juliana

Marie' FCC/AOS.

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August: In Your Orchid Collection By Martin Motes

PROGRESS OF THE SEASON

Excerpted from Florida Orchid Growing: Month by Month by Martin Motes. All rights reserved.

July and August are the two most similar months in South Florida. Most of the advice on watering, disease and pest control in last month’s calendar still apply but subtle changes are taking place. Although it may not seem so, as temperatures climb into the low nineties most afternoons, summer is in retreat: each day a little short-er, each night a little longer. With shorter days the importance of watering as early in the morning as possible comes to the fore. With less hours of sunlight to dry the plants, extra care should be taken in choosing when to water. Back to the basics of the classic saying : If a Vanda looks like it needs water, water it; If a Cattleya or Oncidium looks like it needs water, water it tomorrow. If a Paph or a Phal looks like it needs water, you should have watered it yesterday. If plants retain water even from an early morning watering, allowing them to dry a bit harder before the next watering is always a good idea. An extra day of drying rarely does harm.

August should provide numerous opportunities to dry each orchid to its desired level of dryness. Take the op-portunity to dry your orchids "hard" at least once but preferably twice in August. This will give your orchids a leg up on their mortal enemies, the fungus, before the drizzle of September switches the advantage to our adversaries. August is definitely not the month to over indulge in water. September, the soggiest of months, is next up. The corollary to this calculated drying is the concept that when watering in August above all water thoroughly. If watering is necessary be sure that the roots and medium are totally saturated with the applica-tion. The drizzling rains of September are so detrimental precisely because they keep the foliage of the plants wet unduly long. We want our plants which are still growing to receive plenty of water but also plenty of dry-ing time.

Good air circulation and proper watering are the keys to disease prevention. Remember that your plants will have increased considerably in size by this point in the growing season. They have added extra growths and extra leaves across the summer. August is a good time to evaluate the spacing of our plants. Remember the old Florida saw that one needs a cat to grow good orchids because when properly spaced a cat should be able to navigate the benches between plants without knocking them over. While we can not recommend specific chemicals, the county agent recommends Banrot, a convenient combination of Thiophanate-methyl and Tru-ban which controls a number of leaf-spotting diseases and soft rots, for home owner use. A combination of Thiophanate-methyl and mancozeb has also been recommended. This can be found pre-packaged as Duosan. If one can over come the aversion to chemicals and can learn the safe application of them, they are valuable tools to better orchid growing. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure especially before the soft, slow drizzle of September sets in.

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Lengthening nights in August mean cooler nighttime temperatures. Many sympodial orchids are reaching the end

of their growing cycle and require less nitrogen. Cattleyas and oncidiums have maturing bulbs. Genera that become

deciduous in winter like nobile dendrobiums, calanthes and catasetums should be given much less nitrogen in Au-

gust to prevent them producing an unwanted off season growth and perhaps forgetting to flower. Substitute an

additional application of potassium nitrate and Epsom salt (1TBS each per gal) instead of the balanced 20-20-20.

Vandas will respond well to this also, as several of the parental species of our hybrids produce blooms on shorten-

ing day lengths and lower levels of nitrogen in their fertilizer seems to egg them on. As explicated in the last chap-

ter, modern research indicates that orchids require less phosphorous than previously thought. This concept should

lead us to more judicious use of phosphorus. Fertilizer high in phosphorus may still be of some value at the end of

the growing season, perhaps not so much as stimulus as shock. One or two heavy applications in succession, a

week or so apart will certainly provide all the phosphorus and all the stimulus (or wake up shock) our plants require

to bloom.

Snails can be somewhat of a problem in August too, but left to multiply they will be in their full glory when those

slow unrelenting rains of September set in. Control them with baits in pellet or liquid/paste form. Remember, these

are baits, the pests are drawn to them. Therefore apply lightly, but frequently. Because they wash away in the

heavy rains, baits should be reapplied every two weeks. One pellet every two to three feet will do the job, but one

application will not. Given a choice, the smallest pellets baits are best. They keep us from over applying and also

pose much less threat to neighborhood pets. A small bait in a Vanda crown is a nuisance, a large bait can be a dis-

aster.

If you have been waiting to make cuttings of the terete vandas or reed stem epidendrums, you can wait no longer.

The potting season is drawing absolutely to a close. Pot up those overgrown phals before they even think of spik-

ing. Re-set those strap leaf vandas early in August whilst they still have just enough time to re-establish themselves

in the September humidity and before the cool weather arrives and their root growth slows or stops. As in all sea-

sons be sure that the plants are firmly set in their containers. There is no "wiggle room" this late in the growing sea-

son to restart tender roots that have been chafed off a loosely set plant. As the cooler weather approaches try to

give plants that have been repotted late more protection from the first cold snaps.

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JTOS 2019

Board of Directors

President

Weyman Bussey

***

Vice-President

Weyman Bussey

956-369-2932

goldenbear@rocketmail.com

***

Secretary

Dotty Wisch

561-746-7017

dottywisch@comcast.net

***

Treasurer

Cindi Beane

cybeane@bellsouth.net

561-310-5857

***

Past President

Kevin Sue Rohan

561-762-5381

kzooroo@yahoo.com

***

Deborah Sang

Rosemary Miller

Helen Compton

Gladys Robinson

Membership Carol Vogel

561-748-2308

carvogg@aol.com

Newsletter Kim Webster

hkwjupiter@bellsouth.net

Please help make our meetings

more enjoyable by providing a

tasty treat for all to share.

A free raffle ticket is given to those that bring in goodies

ATTENTION MEMBERS!!!

We are in need of volunteers to step up next year to

fill the following roles.

President, Treasurer, Secretary and also someone to

take care our snack table for 2020.

No experience necessary! Training is free! We just

need your willingness to help out!

Our society is run by volunteers. If you enjoy com-

ing to our meetings and would like to help us con-

tinue, please talk with one of our board members

and find out how you can help.

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Meetings are held on the 2nd Wednesday of each Month at 7 pm unless otherwise noted

Jupiter Community Center 200 Military Trail

Board Meetings are held on the following Tuesday after each meeting

at Panera Bread, Indiantown Road at 6:30pm (All members are welcome to attend)

January 2019

9th 7 pm

February 2019

13th 7 pm

March 2019

13th 7 pm

Vern Bloch

Brassavola Nodsa

April 2019

10th 7 pm

Roy Tokunaga

H&R Nursery

Dendrobiums, Species

And Hybrids

May 2019

8th 7 pm

Auction

June 2019

Sat. 15th start 9am

BBQ-Potluck

Potting Party

Home of Weyman &

Alexis

5515 SE Ault Ave

Stuart, FL

July 2019

10th 7 pm

John Budree

Paph’s in South

Florida

August 2019

14th 7 pm

Jamie Lawson

Catasetums

September 2019

11th 7 pm

Omar Gonzales

Orchid growing

October 2019

9th 7 pm

Prem Subrahmanyam

Endangered Native

Orchids

November 2019

13th 7 pm

Auction

December 2019

11th 6:30

Holiday Party

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