GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

22-08-2005, 10:19 PM

da wrote:
On 22 Aug 2005 10:25:34 -0700, "Ted" wrote:

wrote:
On 22 Aug 2005 04:29:31 -0700, "Ted" wrote:

wrote:
On Mon, 22 Aug 2005 08:27:10 +0200, Reka
wrote:

Central Ontario Orchid Society Show and Sale

Date: September 24th, 2005 at 11 am, through the 25th

Location: Hespeler Arena, 640 Ellis Road, Cambridge, ON

[snip]
Although I hate to point out that Guelph is not Cambridge, thank you
very much. g

OK, I stand corrected. I thought COOS had its show at the University of
Guelph. That is where I attended one a few years ago.

I take it Cambridge is a wee village just outside Guelph? :-)

Guelph is a sad cousin to the much grander g Cambridge (population
106,000 vs. over 120,000). Cambridge is part of Waterloo Country,
Guelph is part of Wellington County.

Ah, so they're both wee villages, compared to Toronto which has a
population of how many gazillion people, and only one, me, who would
admit having been born and raised there. I am, I admit, living in an
even smaller village called Orillia, population about 30,000. ;-)

Orillia may be small but it the spot to head once you've come in from
the water and you want to restock the galley in the boat. The town
definitely has its own charms, and besides Rama is probably the best
Casino in the province. That's got to count for something, right? g

You really are the only person who admits to being born and raised in
the big smoke. All the other "natives" refuse to call Toronto home,
and instead insist they're from Etobicoke or North York or Downsview
or Scarborough. I mean seriously, everything from Mississauga to
Pickering is essentially Toronto to anybody who isn't from Toronto.
g

You have that right. I am not fond of city life. For me, the smaller
the "urban centre" the better. There is only one thing in Toronto that
I miss, and that is the University of Toronto, and especially its
libraries and bookstore. The wealth of IT providers is useful too, but
since I don't routinely buy a new computer, and there are decent
suppliers up here, that isn't enough of an issue to worry about. After
all, Toronto is only down the 400.

Both are good universities in their own areas of expertise. It's nice
to have so much depth in what is essentially a small area, especially
when you add WLU into the mix.

What is WLU's greatest strength?

I am not surprised at what you say about the water, but given that
Cambridge and Waterloo are so close, is their's much better?

I'm not sure where Guelph pulls its water from, but it's foul nasty
stuff. A friend of mine has been house sitting in Guelph, and she has
been taking Toronto tap water with her because the Guelph stuff is so
bad.

;-) It must be bad if she prefers Toronto water.

Cambridge used to pull its water from aquifers and springs. Sometime
over the past few years (since the city got pulled further into
regional politics) the decision was made to take water out of the
Grand River and treat the hell out of it with massive doses of
chlorine and whatever other chemicals that supposedly make it safe for
human consumption. Water in Kitchener and Waterloo really depends on
what particular part of the city you happen to be in. It could range
from drinkable to near-Guelph in taste.

I guess there is a good future for water treatment and supply
companies, like Water Depot, who sell bottled spring water and various
equipment and supplies for treating municipal and well water. There
are two that I am aware of n Orillia and they seem to be doing quite
well despite the small population..

The snooty responses were mainly from people with displays for
judging. After the "not phals" bit, they'd wave a hand and say those
are my "phrags/catts/whatever" over there." Now maybe that's because
the people didn't know each other (now I'm working on the assumption
that they travelled from the general Southern Ontario area, but I had
no way of knowing that then). Still, despite a good number of phals in
the displays, I never found anybody who said they grew them.

Ah, OK. I rarely met private growers/collectors who put up displays.
Rather, I talked with vendors, including those vendors who put up
displays. When they weren't overwhelmed by potential customers, they
proved to be quite chatty.

And the plants I have seen displayed by vendors have been spectacular,
at least those of blooming size. There are several that sell very good
plants, though, but they're not so spectacular since they're no-where
near blooming size yet.

I was pretty upfront with all the vendors I spoke with. I described my
growing conditions, and said I was new to orchids. Pretty much all of
them told me, "well I won't sell you a plant because it won't grow
there." Now that's fine up to a point. You don't want to pass a hard
to grow plant off on a newbie, but I was hoping somebody would say,
"well how about one of these xyzs" They're good for beginners. About
the only one who wanted to sell me a plant was really, really pushy,
so much so that I really got a bad feeling about the seller.

Hmmmm, you seem to have been rather unlucky that time around. I do
know one vendor who only sells to people with plenty of experience, but
that is because he specializes in genera that are very hard to grow,
even for professionals. But he has produced countless awarded specimen
plants.

Now, if you're interested, SOOS has classes specifically for those who
have little or no experience growing orchids. I would suppose that
most orchid societies have these, but I haven't seen much about this on
other sites (possibly because I wasn't looking for it).

You probably already know this, from this group, but he phals, catts
and dends, and possibly paphs and phrags are probably among the easiest
to grow.

You could also use price as a guide. If you can get a near blooming
size plant for $10, you're not going to be too upset if t dies, so it
is suitable material for experimenting. This is like what I told my
neices who wanted to try to grow orchids. I told that to get a couple
of the $2 african violets, and if they could keep them alive for
twoyears, I'd consider getting them an orchid. Alas, they have yet to
succeed in keeping an african violet alive for more than six months. I
think, at their age, it is hard for them to maintain the discipline of
caring for a plant. They quickly forget them in the hustle and burtle
of school work, girlgriends, boyfriends, &c. Maybe when they grow up a
little.

As for your fertilizer, once you understand plant nutrition, and issues
surrounding macronutrients and micronutrients, understanding the
rationale for different fertilizer compositions because easier. What
may help is if you visit your nearest library and ask for help finding
a book dealing with plant growth and development as affected by
nutrition. And, of course, there is a wealth of related information on
the web. It is hard to know what to do with the advice some of the
growers give without first doing that background research. And this
forum is a priceless resource for making sense of all this!

I really don't want to have to study enough to write a thesis on
fertilizer. Honestly the whole subject matter just gets my head
spinning. g At the time I just wanted something that was going to

Writing a thesis is serious over kill, for what you want. All you want
in a book is something basic, say written for a first or second year
undergraduate course. A little light reading that can be completed in
a few days, or weeks; something that will give you the basics of plant
nutrition.

Of course every little bit of advice helps. So just in case I decide
to go this year, what are you doing there? Displaying? Selling?
Judging?

None of the above! I will be going to meet up with old friends and to
start to rebuild my collection. Most of the time, when I get a plant,
it is to build my collection, and so will never be sold. It might, if
I make a mistake, end up in the compost, but that is not by design. I
hope to begin again on finding breeding stock for phals, focussing on
species, perhaps linebred, and then breeding for a combination of
colour, scent and fast growth. I'd expect that even if I found all the
breeding stock I want within the next year, it would be close to a
decade before I'd have something I'd consider selling.

I don't want to get into judging just yet; not until I can start to
relax, and that won't be until after my new business is well
established.

Cheers,

Ted

R.E. (Ted) Byers, Ph.D., Ed.D.
R & D Decision Support Solutions
http://www.randddecisionsupportsolutions.com/
Healthy Living Through Informed Decision Making
I hope this helps.