Welcome to the Palomar Orchid Society Website!

The Palomar Orchid Society, incorporated in December of 1965 was formed when a few people banded together to talk about orchids. We then grew and bloomed into the roughly 200-member group of orchid enthusiasts that we have today. We represent everything orchid in North San Diego County! Come and join us!!

The Palomar Orchid Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting the understanding and cultivation of both hybrid and species orchids. We welcome members of all levels to join us for orchid fun and learning! Our mission is to promote interest in the appreciation of orchids and to provide an opportunity for their display and the exchange and dissemination of information relating to their culture.

General Meeting June 2021

June 2021 – WELCOME BACK!

Based on the recent positive polling of our membership, we are resuming our in-person society meetings on Wednesday, June 2. The meeting will be held at our regular location, the Lake San Marcos Conference Center, starting at 6:30 pm

For our first meeting, we will not have a formal speaker but have an informal meeting consisting of a Q&A session for attendees who have pressing questions about their orchids that weren’t addressed during the last year and a half. It would be desirable for attendees to send us your questions in advance so we can select ones to address during the session. Please send them to Alex and Bill. Our own expert growers, Jerry Spencer, Ken Campbell and Alex Nadzan will try to answer your burning questions.

In addition to the Q&A session, we will have a Show and Tell, a plant table, and a silent auction for those who may want to sell some plants. There also will be ample time for socializing. For this month, the society will provide light snacks, water and coffee so don’t bring anything other than yourself, a friend and your plants.

Please note that we will abide by existing state and local guidelines at the time of the meeting so bring your masks and please do not attend if you are not fully vaccinated yet or you feel ill.

The July 7th meeting will resume our formal speaker program starting with one of our most favorite speakers, Fred Clarke, who also will provide a plant table.

We hope to see all of you on June 2nd!

Date: 
Wed, 06/02/2021 - 6:30pm - 9:30pm

May 2021 Culture Class – Photographing Your Orchids

Onc. hastilabium – Debby HallidayOnc. hastilabium – Debby HallidayDebby Halliday, Jack Schaefer & Stewart Walton all really enjoy taking photographs of their orchids. We all strive for accurate and vibrant color, perfect details, and a quiet background. We have different approaches to achieving these goals and thought you might enjoy knowing more about how we do it.

We also have various ways of managing our photo libraries and utilizing our photos. Debby uses hers as a primary means of documenting the progress of her plants from year to year. She also shares her hi-res images with the club to use in its promotional activities.

Jack is careful with the background and staging of his plants, to highlight the shape and color of the flower. Stewart looks for good sharpness, contrast and color in his photos, whether indoors or outdoors. He uses his cellphone primarily, and often overrides its automatic features for the best shot. We will welcome your questions and hope you will come away with some ideas about taking better photos of your plants.

Date: 
Wed, 05/05/2021 - 7:30pm - 9:30pm

May 2021 – Gary Yong Gee (online presentation)

Gary Yong GeeGary 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.

Date: 
Tue, 05/04/2021 - 7:30pm - 9:00pm

San Diego Botanic Garden – World of Orchids

  Read more »

Date: 
Sat, 04/03/2021 - 10:00am - Sun, 05/02/2021 - 5:00pm

April 2021 – Glen Decker (online presentation)

Glen DeckerGlen 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 »

Date: 
Tue, 04/06/2021 - 7:00pm - 9:30pm

March 2021 – David Haelterman (online presentation)

David HaeltermanDavid HaeltermanOur Zoom meeting on Tuesday, March 2 at 7:30 pm will feature David Haelterman speaking on "The Genus Maxillaria in Colombia." David has lived in Cali, Columbia for 6 years, exploring the region as an orchid enthusiast and educator. Cali is a major metropolis, sitting in the Valle del Cauca, just to the East of the Farallones de Cauda, the very bio-diverse coastal mountain range.

He worked as an agronomist in his native Belgium, developing urban agriculture projects with schools and encouraging biodiversity through ecologically productive small-scale parcels. In Colombia, he explores the mountains, leads tours, gives lectures, and photographs especially the orchids of the region. Looking at his photo records, he seems to spend most of his time in the mountains.

In parallel to these professional activities, he has been passionate about orchids for more than 25 years, growing many genera such as Cattleya, Masdevallia, Restrepia, Odontoglossum, Kefersteinia, Pescatoria, Eriopsis, Stanhopea and allied, as well as Maxillaria, on which he is particularly specialized. His center of interest is especially focused on orchid taxonomy, their biogeography and their conservation in the wild.   Read more »

Date: 
Tue, 03/02/2021 - 7:30pm - 9:30pm

February 2021 – Courtney Hackney (online presentation)

Dr. Courtney HackneyDr. 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.

Date: 
Tue, 02/02/2021 - 7:30pm - 9:30pm

January 2021 – Ron Parsons (online presentation)

Ron ParsonsRon ParsonsOur first Joint POS/SDCOS Zoom meeting of the year will be on Tuesday, January 5th at 7:30 pm and feature Ron Parsons. Ron is well-known to many of our members since he has spoken to our society several times. On Tuesday, he will present to us a new talk on ‘Orchid Rarities and Oddities’. This talk features some of the strangest and rarest plants in the orchid family, and includes both terrestrial and epiphytic species. The majority of terrestrial orchids are not in cultivation, and many of those shown were photographed in nature. Most of the epiphytic species presented are in cultivation, and though some may be relatively common, others are not, but hopefully all will inspire awe.

Ron Parsons has been growing orchids for more than 45 years, and has been interested in species orchids for most of that time. Ron loves to photograph orchids and most other flowers whenever he can, whether it be on trips to see them in nature or in collections. He loves to travel to see orchids in the wild, and does so as often as possible. Ron has more than 80,000 digital images, most of which are of orchids, and still retains a slide library that exceeds 100,000 botanical images. He has 4000 published photos that have appeared in magazines, periodicals, journals and books.    Read more »

Date: 
Tue, 01/05/2021 - 7:30pm - 9:30pm

December's Presidents' Message

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 »