Monthly Meetings – Page 11 – South Florida Orchid Society

September Members Meeting: Armando Mantellini

Sep 062015

Armando Mantellini

We at the South Florida Orchid Society bring the most distinguished world class orchidist speakers. This month we bring you a man recognized all over the world. A world class pioneer in Cattleya species, Armando Mantellini. Born in Caracas, Venezuela. With a master’s degree in both mechanical and electrical engineering, orchid breeding since 1966 in his native Venezuela is his true love. Armando is mostly interested in Venezuelan and Colombian cattleya species. Fresh from giving a lecture at the annually cattleya symposium, Armando will speak on Breeding Cattleya mossiae. So sit back and enjoy. The master is in the house.
Jorge Merlo—Program Chairman

69th Miami International Orchid Show

Click Here for a list of Show Vendors

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August 19th Meeting: RIO Orchids

Monthly Meetings

Aug 112015

In this day and age, all over the orchid community, we see long time growers and nursery owners retiring or just going out of business. We are delighted to find right in our own back yard a young couple ready to take on the challenge of turning their dream from hobby to a commercial nursery operation.

Angie Villanueva and Luis Del Pino purchased Ruben Sauleda’s nursery Ruben in Orchids, and right away, they started to add their touch. Adding new offices, remodeling the greenhouses and bring the beautiful grounds back to life and changing the name to Rio Orchids .Everyday management is run by Richard who worked with Ruben for over 30 years.

They continue to specialize in orchid flasking. At Rio, they cross their own amazing hybrids, which they sell to growers all over the world. They also maintain a supply of species and exotic orchids that are among our favorites. They are all grown to thrive in our South Florida environment.

Their presentation will focus on Orchid Propagation methods that have been in place for over 50 years. They will cover orchid pollination, flasking, seedlings, divisions, off shoots, back bulbs, and cuttings.

Let’s all welcome Angie and Luis to the South Florida Orchid Society family and support our local orchid nurseries.

Jorge Merlo
SFOS Program Director

RIO Orchids will be providing plants for both our regular and special raffle this month!

In addition, they will also have plants for sale!

7:00PM Doors open. Plant judging registration begins.
7:30PM Plant registration ends. Plant judging begins.
8:00PM Program begins.

If you are bringing plants for judging, please have them registered by 7:30PM. No plants will be accepted for judging after that time. This allows our judges time to properly evaluate your plants and also allows them to enjoy the main program with you.

Remember to have your plants cleaned and properly presented. They should be free of debris, insects, spider webs, etc. Although not absolutely necessary, leaves should be wiped with either Leafshine or a little milk and water solution. This makes for a much better presentation and will show when the plants are photographed.

July 15th Meeting

Monthly Meetings

Jul 132015

This month we’re presenting a special culture program with tips on how to get the most enjoyment from your orchids.

Our program includes…

Potting Media and Insecticides by Carlos Cahiz

Jorge Merlo– program undetermined at press time.

Vandeceous Orchids, culture and growing tips by Dan Christensen

You won’t want to miss this informative program!

Also, we will be having a Silent Auction this month

Here are the details…

Last month our board approved silent auctions to be conducted during our monthly meetings, when the visiting speaker does not provide plants for sale. These silent auctions are very successful and accepted by the membership at other societies. The rules are very simple and meant to facilitate and ease the whole process for everybody involved.

These are the rules:

Silent Orchid Auction is a society’s benefit exclusive to current members of SFOS to sell their plants at our meetings. Limited to 2 orchid plants per member. Members and/or guests can bid on any of the plants on auction. The donation to the SFOS after the auction will be 10% commission (minimum $1, commission rounded to nearest whole dollar) on the final auction price. For example: if a plant sales for $10.00, the commission will be $1.00. If the plant sells for $15.00 the commission will be $2.00 and so on. Bring your plants so we can have a successful silent auction on our next meeting July 15th.

June 17th Meeting: Ken & Judy Russ

Monthly Meetings

Jun 082015

Ken Russ

Our June speaker is Ken Russ, who together with his lovely wife Judy, have been growing orchids for more than 20 years and have become multiple AOS award winners. After so manyyears of growing orchids Ken and Judy realized there was a need to share their orchid growing knowledge with all level orchid growers so they decided to create some innovative and practical presentations specially geared to help Florida orchid society members perfect the art of orchid growing

May 20th Meeting: Jim & Melana Davidson

Monthly Meetings

May 022015

Jim & Melana Davison: “Dendrobiums – Soft Cane, Hard Cane, Australian, Pendulous – Which is which?”

Jim & Melana Davison

Jim and Melana Davison are AOS Accredited Judges. They have an extensive and diverse orchid collection that seems to be continuously growing. Not only involved in caring for their orchids, they are actively involved in several South Florida orchid societies. Melana is the current President of both the Orchid Society of Coral Gables and the South Dade Amateur Orchid Club. Jim is the past President of the Orchid Society of Coral Gables and the East Everglades Orchid Society.

April 15th meeting: Mac Rivenbark

Monthly Meetings

Apr 042015

Mac Rivenbark,“An Introduction to Philippine Orchids.”

Mac Rivenbark

Mac and his Filipina wife started an orchid business over 12 years ago after many fascinating trips to the Philippines. With extensive study, Mac is becoming an expert in Philippine as well as other Asian species and currently grows and blooms over 300 different types.

SFOS March 18th Meeting: Larry Cox “Lycastes for South Florida”

Monthly Meetings

Mar 102015

Larry Cox will present our March program. Larry’s lecture is entitled
“Lycastes for South Florida.”

Larry Cox

Larry Cox acquired his first orchid, a cattleya, over 40 years ago. His second orchid was a paphiopedilum. He has grown cattleyas, dendrobiums, phalaenopsis, oncidiums, vandas, and less popular genera; but paphs eventually became his favorite orchids and the heart of his collection. In 1989, he moved to the Redlands area of south Miami-Dade County where he built his dream orchid house of 3000 square feet and continued to increase his collection with emphasis on multifloral paphs. Larry enjoys showing his orchids and has earned forty-six awards, including five FCC’s, from the American Orchid Society.

January 21st Meeting: Sheldon Takasaki of Carmela Orchids, Hawaii

Monthly Meetings

Jan 082015

Sheldon Takasaki, the owner of Carmela Orchids in Hawaii, will present our January program. His program is titled “Everything you wanted to know about Hawaiian Orchids and some other secrets”. If you have never heard Sheldon speak you are in for a treat!!

SFOS November 19th Meeting: Jim Watts “Leafless Orchids, fascination and frustration!”

Monthly Meetings

Oct 292014

Our November program will be presented by Jim Watts. Jim will present a program titled “Leafless Orchids, fascination and frustration!” This program is a review of the various leafless genera and their species, discussing the habitat and growth habit of these fascinating orchids

Jim started growing orchids in 1994 in Tallahassee with 6 equitants and a phalaenopsis. When he moved to Miami for University of Miami in 1996 he thought he was in heaven! As he expanded his collection, his two main areas of interest became Tolumnia and the leafless orchids. He pestered the AOS editors to feature an article on leafless orchids in the Orchids magazine for almost two years. He was doing a lot of research on his own, and was hoping for more information. Finally in frustration, the AOS editors told him to write one himself if he really wanted to see it. So, in March 2003 issue of Orchids, his article was published. He had a reprint for society newsletters from around the globe, including the Canary Islands, Canada, and all over the United States. Jim is an Accredited AOS Judge, having joined the program at the Florida Caribbean Judging Center. He now lives in Hollywood, FL.

The plant raffle table will be a selection of phals and paphs that were donated to SFOS from Pine Ridge Orchids. Dan & Margie Orchids will supply the blooming plants for our special raffles.

We hope you will join us for this interesting and informative program.

Guillermo Salazar
Program Chairman

Reminder: Any plants you wish to have considered for judging must be entered no later than 7:30PM. This allows our judges ample time to properly evaluate your orchids and, if necessary, present them for award photography before the main program begins.

SFOS October 15th Meeting: Paul Phelps “Cattleyas, The Queen of Orchids”

Monthly Meetings

Oct 122014

Paul Phelps of Phelps Farm Orchids, Inc. will present our October program. The program titled “Cattleyas, The Queen of Orchids” is a hands on presentation that will talk about culture, potting and repotting, fertilizer needs and other growing tips specific to growing the Cattleya alliance.

Phelps Farm Orchids Inc. is a commercial Orchid farm located on five acres in North West Hillsborough County about 15 minutes north of the Tampa International Airport. The business was started in 1986 by Paul and Patricia Phelps and grew out of Patricia’s love of orchid collecting, into a thriving commercial operation. At the time the business was started, the growing area was 3500 square feet of Quonset greenhouse. In 1992 the greenhouse was doubled to 7000 square feet. In 2012 a 1600 square foot greenhouse was built to house hanging and mounted Orchids that require daily watering.

Cattleyas are the specialty of the house but other genera are grown there as well. A breeding program was started in the late ‘80’s with the main focus on the Cattleya alliance. At present Paul has made over 800 hybrids.

A web site was brought on line in 1994 featuring an on line catalog. You can visit this site at www.phelpsfarm.com. This web site is currently undergoing a renovation including a shopping cart for online ordering and a link to articles about Orchid culture and other relative information. Locally Phelps Farm Orchids was featured on NBC’s Daytime show with Cyndi Edwards and nationally they were featured on the PBS series Americas Heartland. If you would like to see the episode on the web, go to www.americasheartland.org, Click on Stories, choose Season 5 and click on Episode 503 and then select the story called Petal Pushers.

Phelps Farm Orchids, Inc. will be providing the plant raffle table as well as bringing plants for sale. Many of the plants Paul & Patricia are bringing were produced at their nursery from their breeding program.

We hope you will join us for the wonderful program. Guests are always welcome at our meetings.

Remember, plants brought for judging must be entered no later than 7:30 PM!

Plant judging is from 7:30PM until 8:00PM

Program begins at 8:00PM

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