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Want something printed in the newsletter? E-mail it to nwos_news@nwos.org no later than the 25th of the month.

May 2012
Volume 65, Issue 10


About the May Meeting

May 14, 2012
7:00 P.M.
University of Washington
Center for Urban Horticulture
3501 NE 41st Street
Seattle, WA 98105


Sam Tsui: the Brachypetalum and Parvispalum Paphiopedilums and their Culture

 

Sam was born in Hong Kong on November 23, 1952. He traveled to the United States at the age of 22.  He attended Illinois State University graduating with a bachelor's degree in computer science and a minor in accounting.  He has since completed his MBA.  While still an undergraduate student, Sam was employed by Country Insurance and Financial Services based in Bloomington-Normal, Illinois. He retired January, 2008 from Country Insurance and Financial Services as a Senior Software Developer in their Information Systems Division. Sam is now concentrating, full time, on his orchid growing business.

 

Sam met Jeanie Ting while studying at the university. Jeanie is also from Hong Kong. They were married In May, 1983.

 

He began growing orchids in the early 1980's. After trying many types of orchids, he became a serious Paphiopedilum grower in 1985. In 1990, he began hybridizing with Paphiopedilums and continues that work today. As he became more involved with Paphiopedilums, he started selling commercially in 1995 as the Orchid Inn. He grew orchids in his basement and greenhouses attached to his house. As the business grew, in 2004, he purchased six acres of property and built his first commercial 6,000 square feet greenhouse. Currently he makes over 300 crosses, produces 4,000 to 5,000 flasks or approximately 100.000 seedlings annually.

 

In the past 15 years, Sam has been very active in the orchid world by traveling to shows, promoting sales, and lecturing. Sam currently fills orders from around the world and attends over 20 orchid shows/conferences a year. He also does approximately 20 Paphiopedilum programs/lectures to orchid conferences, societies and groups annually in the USA, Canada, Japan, Australia and Europe. Over the past 12 years, he has judged at the Japan Grand Prix, the world's largest orchid show.

 

Hybridizing is Sam’s passion. He emphasizes Paphiopedilum species, Brachypetalum, Parvisepalum and Multifloral hybrids. He only selects the best, most vigorous parent plants in his collection for breeding/hybridizing.  He continues to improve his breeding stock by selecting plants or flasks from his fellow orchid growers that he believes are outstanding examples of their type.

                                                                                        

As a result of Sam’s breeding program, his orchids have been honored with approximately one hundred and ninety-eight awards (as of March 24th, 2012) from the American Orchid Society, Cymbidium Society of America and European Orchid Congress. His most prestigious awards include eleven First Class Certificate (FCC/AOS) awards; three Cultural awards including an 93 points Certificate of Cultural Excellence (CCE/AOS) award; and seven breeder Award of Quality (AQ/AOS) awards. All these awards are from American Orchid Society.

 

 

Display Table:
Bring your blooming Orchids so everyone can enjoy them.

 

Sales Table:
Members may bring up to 10 plants to sell. Double tag with your name and cost.

 

Raffle:
We will all have a chance to purchase tickets for the raffle plants.

 


The Gary Baker Service Award

 

Every year at our June meeting we honor a special member of NWOS for outstanding contributions to the society.  Nominations can be made by any member and the winner is decided by ballot of the board members.  Several individuals have already be nominated.  I will accept additional nominations by email until the next board meeting on May 8th.  You may give me nominations by email.

 

George Grantham

georgegrantham@hotmail.com

 


Orchid Shows Past and Future

 

The Spokane Orchid Society Show and Sale was held  March 31 and April 1.  Far from being an April Fool’s joke, it was an excellent show and extremely well attended.  The NWOS display consisted of  54 plants from the following members: Susan O’Connell, George Krasle, Daniel Kerr, Ellen Covey, Mike Foster and Donna Pearce, Kyong Hu, Jerry Hoffmeister, Mike Cory and Cylvia and myself.  There were 54 plants in our display and we received 22 show ribbons.  Due to the high quality of plants in the show overall we didn’t receive any ”Best Of” awards nor any AOS nominations or awards.  The AOS trophy went to the Spokane Society.  Hopefully next year we can ferret out some really stunning plants to give the Spokane folks some competition. 

 

Of course the other big news was the success of our own show at Sky this year.  My sense was that it was the most successful show we have had for a number of years in terms of the general ambiance of the show.  Attendance was good.  Visitors were enthusiastic and made many favorable comments about the show.   Our own display carried over the music theme from the Flower and Garden show.   Volunteers worked exceptionally hard from the setup Friday through to cleanup on Sunday to make our display and the entire show a success.  It was good to see our very own Ellen Covey as a new vendor and thanks to the efforts of Andy Wright, Joff Morgan and Peter Maunsell a great selection of species from Andy’s Orchids was offered.  Andy Wright set up his own display in the show area with a wonderfully displayed selection of species orchids.  Thank you to all who contributed plants and who volunteered to help with the show. 

 

The South Central Washington Orchid Society is having their show in  Kennewick May 6-7.  Mike and Abby will take down a modest sized display and Cylvia and I will bring them back Sunday.  Tacoma Orchid Society is planning a show June 30-July1.  This is the first summer show in our area in quite a while.  We will definitely want to send a display to this show and will need some help with it because Cylvia and I will not be available most of the weekend.  More about this show later. 

 

Thanks again to everyone for generously sharing their plants for display at these shows.

 

George Grantham, 2nd Vice President

 


 

The NWOS April Show and Sale

 

Thanks to everyone that helped make the Show and Sale such a success!!!!! We had great weather which helped draw folks into Sky Nursery. Both the Show and Sales areas were buzzing with people of all various levels of Orchid growing, which is inspiring. Combining the Show and Sale in the greenhouse space was the biggest improvement from the 2011 event. The Sky staff were happy to have us and have invited us back for 2013.  Dates are set for the weekend of April 6 & 7 with set up on Friday the 5th. Put this date on your calendar and as we get closer consider becoming part of the show committee to help with the coordination.

 

Mike Foster

 

 

NWOS 2012 Best in Show Awards

 

Paphiopedilum and Novice

Paph. Dark Master – Ron & Jan Hippp

South Central WA Society

  

Cattleya Alliance

Euchile citrina – Laima Swanson

Spokane Society

 

Dendrobium Alliance

Dendrobium spectabile – Roxanne Rosson

Northwest Society

 

Oncidium/Odontoglossum Alliance

Wilsonara Aloha Sparks – Bill Blair

South Central WA Society

 

Phalaenopsis Alliance

Phal. Sogo Golden FANGtastic – David Edgley

Mount Baker Society

 

Pleurothallid Alliance

Pleurothallis cypripedioides – Mike Pearson & Abigail Chang

Northwest & Mount Baker Societies

 

Phragmipedium

Phrag. Jason Fischer – Betty Wise

South Central WA Society

 

Other Genera

Dendrochilum cobbianum – Out on a Limb

Out on a Limb Orchids

 

Miniature

Schoenorchis gemmata – Out on a Limb

Out on a Limb Orchids

 

First Bloomed

Paph. vietnamense – Mike Foster & Donna Pierce

Northwest Society

 

President's Choice

Cyclopogon lindeyanus – Jamie Notman

Northwest Society

 

 

AOS Award Winners

 

Show Trophy for Most Outstanding Orchid Exhibit

Out on a Limb Orchids

 

Award of Merit

Paph. Dark Master – Ron & Jan Hipp

South Central WA Society

 

Award of Merit

Bulbophyllum thaiorum – George & Cylvia Granthum

Northwest Society

 

 

 Here's a few of the winners:                                Photos courtesy of Joff Morgan and Diane Drisch

 

Paph. Dark Master

Euchile

citrina

Dendrobium spectabile

 

Phal. Sogo Golden FANGtastic

Pleurothallis cypripedioides

 
  Dendrochilum cobbianum    

 

Schoenorchis gemmata

 
  Out on a Limb's winning display Hawaii Dreamin'  

 

Mike shows off the Grantham's orchid that later won an AOS Award of Merit

 Jeanne puts the finishing touches on the

Volunteer Park Conservatory display

 

George expertly builds the staging for the NWOS display

Spokane Orchid Society

 setting up

Chris prepares one of the

 banners for hanging

 

 Abigail and Mike decipher handwriting and enter plant registration

Andy setting up the sales area for Andy's Orchids

a large selection of Phalaenopsis

 

beautiful exhibits Oh...look at that one! Emerald City Orchid display

 

NWOS Display

   South Central WA Orchid Society Display

 

checking out the beauties at Emerald City Orchid

Olympic Orchids display

Expert help to make the perfect

selection at SeattleOrchid.com

 

Andy and Peter

answer questions

filling baskets at

Out on a Limb Orchids

Olympic Orchids sales area

 

a very busy checkout table

 After dancing the Vanilla Valtz,

Leanna & Ellen enjoy a lively round

of the Angraecum Shuffle

 

 

Too soon, it's time to wheel it all out Here's David helping to pack up

 

Almost done, there's just a few plants left on the tables before they're taken down and the area is cleared and swept up.

 


 

Report from the April Meeting

 

David Edgley gave a great talk about recent developments in the breeding and culture of Phalaenopsis.

 

It was a very informative talk with excellent photos of many gorgeous phalaenopsis.  He discussed the various areas showing interest from breeders including:  yellows, eye catching colors, reds, harlequins, mini harlequins, multi florals, novelty, tie died and bigfoot hybrids.  To the right is a picture of what he has deemed the #1 orchid.

David Edgley   Dtps. Chian Xen Piano 'CX339' FCC/AOS

 

After David talked, Abigail Chang talked about the upcoming show at Sky Nursery.  Since it's an AOS judged show, she showed slides and reviewed the process of how we should enter our plants.  She made the process easy to understand which helped encourage participation.

 

We did not formally review the plant table, but the members had ample time during breaks to see what others had brought in.   Here are some of those plants.

 

a nicely grown plant with 3 blooming spikes

Blc. Bill Worsley x L. cinnabarina,    Roxanne Rosson   Lc. Excellency 'Og' x Blc. Mem. O. Rosales, Dan Kerr

 

Lc. Netrasiri 'Dark Prince', George Krasle

Blc. Frank's Primate x

Lc. Drumbeat, Dan Kerr

 

Cattleya hybrid,

George Krasle

 

C intermedia var. coerulea 'Joe' x C. intermedia var. coerulea, Dan Kerr

L. purpurata 'Mood Indigo' x C (intermedia var.

aquinii coerulea x amethystoglossa), Dan Kerr

 

Baptistonia echinata,

George Krasle

Coelogyne corymbosa, Mike Foster &

Donna Pierce

Gongora quinquenervis, Dan Kerr

 

 

Oncidium Golden Anniversary,

Diane Drisch

Bllra. Marfitch 'Howard's Dream' AM/AOS,

 George Krasle

Colm. Wildcat 'Bloodshot', Roxanne Rosson

 

 

Miltoniopsis phalaenopsis,

Jon Owens

Epi. floribundum 'Miyao',

Mike Foster &

Donna Pierce

Masdevallia Bobcat 'Snow Leopard', Leza Beemster

 

Phal. Baldan's Kaleidoscope 'Golden Treasure' AM/AOS, Diane Drisch

Dtps. Chian Xen Super Idol 'CX255' FCC/AOS, Emerald City Orchids.  Recently Awarded

 

Sarchochilus hartmannii,

George Krasle

Rest. antenifera 'Red',

Mike Foster & Donna Pierce

 

 

Sarchochilus closeup

 

 

Paph. (Danaqueen 'Bronzewing' x (Happy Landing x Blagrose)),

Dan Kerr

Paph. Fair Fred 'Double Double' x Paph. primulinum fma. purpurasce 'Tall 50', Roxanne Rosson

Paph. Divisadero x Stone Lovely, Mike Foster & Donna Pierce

 

Paph. Winston Churchill x

In Charm White, Mike Foster & Donna Pierce

 

Paph. rothschildianum x Paph. kolopakingii, Emerald City Orchids

 

Paph. Norito Hasegewa,

Mike Foster & Donna Pierce

 

 

 


 

Schedule of Upcoming Events

 

June 11, 2012 - Annual Potluck & Gary Baker Service Award

 

August ? - The Annual Picnic at the Maunsell's

 


 

Reminder for Officers & Board Members

 

The schedule of meetings for the rest of this fiscal year is: 5/8/12.  Meet at 7 p.m. at Mike Cory's house unless notified that it's been moved elsewhere.

 



SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENTS

 

 

Save the date!

 

Northwest Regional Meeting of the International Phalaenopsis Alliance

 

Join us for a fun day on October 20th featuring:

 

Peter Lin, Big Leaf Orchids

Southlake, TX

 

Program:  Creating Novelty Phalaenopsis for Color and Fragrance

 

Peter will be bringing plants from his novelty and species breeding program for sale.

 

Program starts at 9 a.m. at Orchidaceae, Inc.

 

Hotel rooms have been set aside at La Quinta 509-525-2522 for $109 per night.

 

Call or email RSVP to 509-525-9566 or sales@orchidaceae.com

 

Orchidaceae is hosting dinner at the greenhouse the evening before for people staying the night.

 

Orchidaceae, Inc.

2022 Wallula Avenue

Walla Walla, WA  99362

www.orchidaceae.com

509-525-9566