I looked up the name of the woman who asked here in rgo about boarding
orchids for an article, but she signed herself "Sasa Woodruff". Funny
that two would be writing articles about this topic in CA.

I would love to have Jeff's collection if his plants average $50 apiece!

Reka

Americans spend hundreds a month for orchid babysitters
KIM CURTIS
Associated Press

BOLINAS, Calif. - They're temperamental, but tough. Sensitive, yet
strong. They bloom infrequently, but beautifully. And some say figuring
out how to make orchids thrive at home can be as challenging as raising
kids.

Like parents packing children off to camp, orchid lovers across the
country are paying hundreds of dollars each month to professionals take
care of the plants when they're not in bloom.

"I have the sickness," admits Jeff Doney, a San Francisco architect who
estimates his collection of 200 orchids is worth about $10,000. He
spends $300 a month boarding his plants at California Orchids in
Bolinas. "I might be driving a new Jaguar for the same price."

Doney is fighting his addiction. He recently reduced his monthly bill
from $500 by weeding out less desirable plants. And he's trying to buy
fewer new ones, although he's constantly tempted by an endless parade of
new breeds and hybrids.

"It's time to stop," Doney says. "I'm satisfied with what I have."

Experts conservatively estimate there are 25,000 different varieties of
orchids, excluding hybrids.

Vienna Anderson, who has 15 flowering plants in her Richmond, Va., home,
switched from buying fresh flowers every week to orchids.

"I like the serenity of the plant," she says. "I like the beauty of the
plant."

Anderson spends about $50 a month boarding her 45 plants at Chadwick and
Son Orchids in Powhatan, Va.

"We find we're much like the guy in the wealthy neighborhood where
someone's cutting the lawn, someone's trimming the bushes," owner Art
Chadwick says. "We're taking care of the orchids."

Most orchids typically bloom once or twice a year, some for just a few
weeks at a time. The rest of the time, they're fallow and not
particularly attractive. Some are downright mangy with plain, wide
leaves and exposed roots.

A former wholesaler, Chadwick began boarding orchids 17 years ago.

"Once they buy them, they send them back to us to baby-sit," he says,
adding that he and his staff currently house about 11,000 plants for
about 2,000 customers.

Mary Nisbet, who owns California Orchids, came to California in the
1970s to learn about orchids. She boards about 12,000 plants in five
temperature-controlled greenhouses for 200 customers.

She and five employees repot, fertilize and water the orchids in their
care. Every Friday, they set aside the plants that are beginning to
bloom, notify their owners and deliver them to their homes. When the
blooms fade, the customer calls Nisbet, who sends a driver back to
retrieve the plant.

"They grow slower when people take them home and they come back weaker,"
she says, surveying thousands of plants on pallets in the humid greenhouse.

The flowers are magnificent: reds and pinks, whites and yellows,
speckled and striped; some have softball-sized blossoms, others sport
flowers so tiny they need to be tilted upward with a pinky fingernail.

Orchids are big business. Worldwide, the retail economy in orchids adds
up to about $9 billion; in the United States, wholesalers ship nearly
8.5 million plants a year.

Improvements in breeding and production have resulted in plants that
look flashier, last longer and cost less. In the early 1980s, the
Phalaenopsis, the most popular type of orchid, sold for about $40. Now,
one costs as little as $10 at Home Depot.

"The Orchid Thief: A True Story of Beauty and Obsession" by Susan Orlean
about the shady, sleazy world of orchid poaching, and Spike Jonze's film
"Adaptation," based on the book, have only added to the orchidelirium,
the name Victorians gave orchid collecting fever.

"Everyone's interested in them. They're a good conversation piece,"
Doney says, adding that his plants complement nearly every room of his
1,800-square-foot house. "They're all over the place. I have pretty good
light. They bloom ... then they go back to boarding school."