Our Next meeting on 20 October will be at Steve's collection. Steve is a newish Aspley member, but already an active member of Eastern Districts and the Species Society. He specialises in growing species cattleyas and hybrid dendrobiums in his two orchid houses. Over his 10 years of growing these orchids he has won Show champion at a number of different shows. Among his latest exploits into improving his orchid growing is the installation of a fogger to increase humidity.

                                                                                                                                                         Lynda and Livia
Contact Livia for more information   liviadoidge@gmail.com


What's been happening?

Over 30 people came along to learn about re-potting orchids on our annual Re-potting Day in September. New growers enjoyed looking through Michael's 3 specialty orchid houses. Lynda gave a demonstration then learners visited one of 8 different stations where helpers gave advice on how to repot their orchid. Helping these learners were Aspley Orchid Society members Trish, Peter, Ian, Glenys, Gordon, Livia, Michael and Lynda. The Society also provided all materials for a small cost. Thanks to Sylvia and Bob for setting up the trade table. Margaret, Livia, Louise and Ellen provided a sumptuous morning tea. As you can see, It took quite a team to hold this event. Well done Aspley.

In August, twenty-five of us gathered to see Dave's collection of Dendrobium speciosum or King Orchids. Over time Dave has collected specimums of the many varieties of this orchid that occur all across Eastern Australia. We were able to observe the differences in the flowers of these varieties. Dave also showed us other flowering Australian native species from the tiny Dendrobium lichenastrum  to the renamed Dendrobium teretifolium. After a delicious morning tea, we finished up looking at some colourful Australian native hybrids. Immediately afterwards, many of us traveled to the Australian Native Orchid Show at Strathpine. The auditorium was filled with the fragrance of thousands of Aussie native orchids and the venue provided an opportunity to purchase plants for our own collections. Thanks for a great morning Dave.

 In June we visited Wayne's collection. Wayne has well grown orchids in his beautifully landscaped garden as well as in two "open" style orchid houses. The annex to his lower orchid house provided an area for repotting and materials storage and it was the envy of many of us.  38 of us squeezed onto Wayne's his back deck to hear his tips.  Among other things, he explained how he uses expanded clay balls as an orchid growing medium. The Society also gave an additional talk on watering orchids. Livia, Louise, Wayne and Ellen provided a delicious morning tea and Don and Wayne provided the keen growers with some plants for sale. Thanks for sharing your expertise, Wayne.

In June we visited Gary's collection. We were welcomed by our hosts and a large orchid house on the front boundary at the bottom of a steep drive. Gary specialises in species from all over the world. To give these plants the conditions they require to grow well he has set up 3 different climates in his orchid house.... a cooled section  for cool growing species, a warmed section for warm growing species and finally a section with no climate alteration. Gary shared some growing tips with us and the additional topic of fungus in orchids was covered with many members contributing to our knowledge bank on the subject.  Both experienced and inexperienced growers alike learned a lot by visiting Gary's collection. Thanks, Gary.

We had a delightful morning at Lionel's place on Saturday 26th May. His dendrobiums and cattleys were putting their best foot forward... what a splendid display. To top things off we enjoyed his large collection of anthuriums also. Lionel generously shared his tips for achieving such a display. After an enjoyable morning tea we had an interesting talk from Livia on growing soft cane dendrobiums.

A visit to Marg and Ron’s collection on Saturday 21 April. There was heavy rain on the Friday which continued well into the evening, however on the Saturday morning we woke up to a perfect autumn day. 30 members and 3 visitors attended the meeting and initially we all made our way to visit the orchids which where were in 3 locations. The main shade house housed predominately Cattleyas and Dendrobium hard canes with quite a lot of other genera in small numbers. The soft Cane Dendrobiums were hung on a trellis in the open and thus got the full benefit of all the changes of weather conditions. The 20 or so Phalaenopsis were under cover in a patio area and were grown in Sphagnum Moss. After morning tea Ron gave a very good talk on how he grows and fertilises his orchids. This was followed by a talk by fellow experienced grower on “Preparing Your Orchids for Winter”. This was well accepted, and many members added notes to the 3 handouts provided on the subject. Ellen provided her usual sumptuous morning tea. A very big thanks to Marg and Ron for hosting this meeting.

Steward's Workshop Sun, 11th March
Have you ever thought of supporting your Society by being a Steward for the judges i.e. recording the judging results?
Many of our new growers attended a half day workshop at Lawnton Special School with that in mind. There were lectures and practical activities to help society members get the most out of their Stewarding experience. Stewards work in pairs so that new stewards can be supported by more experienced stewards.

Visit to the Queensland International Orchid Fair on Sat March 3.      Here's a comment from one of our visitors to the Orchid Fair... "Had a great morning, so much interest, far too many choices, shopped maybe a little too much but learned some new things as well. Looking forward to next year."

Visit to Kevin's collection on 24 Feb 2017.  After a couple of days of heavy rain, the weather cleared for our workshop. Kevin has only been growing orchids for 4 years and has developed an extensive collection in that time. He shared some tips on his success and Lynda gave a talk about the main orchid groups. There were plenty of questions and lively discussion from the floor. Ellen provided a very tasty morning tea. Thanks for your generosity, Kevin.

Visiting the collection of Paul Horgan October 2017

Potting Day at Lynda's place August 2017