PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

Meets every third Monday of the month April 2018

The COALITION for ORCHID SPECIES

at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Gardens

10901 Old Cutler Road

Coral Gables, Florida

www.cosspecies.com

Dear Members:

April showers bring May flowers!!!! Since we have not received much rain this month, we better continue watering our babies. When we see the kind of weather that other parts of the country are fac-ing—snow storms, tornadoes, etc.—we are very lucky.

Don’t forget to spray your plants once a month with a pesticide (Orthene, Talstart, etc) to prevent attacks from thrips and scales. If you not have sprayed by now, do it as soon as possible to avoid dam-age to your plants.

Thanks to all of you who helped set up the display at the Coral Gables Orchid Show at Fairchild Gardens. We won the prize for the best display, and Juraj won an award for one of his plants! Congratu-lations to all!

Our speaker this month is Luiz Hamilton, who will speak on bi-foliate cattleyas. Please be sure to attend this month’s meeting, as Luiz will surely give us a lot of good information about these de-lightful catts. We are looking forward to this month’s presentation from Luiz. Carmen and I love bifoliate cattleyas.

Please don’t forget to give us your thoughts on how we can do bet-ter for our club. Your ideas and suggestions are greatly appreciated by all of us at your Board of Directors.

Thank you and happy growing!!!!! Your President, Carlos

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 2

Luiz has been an aficionado of Cattleyas since he was nine years old when he cultivat-ed Cattleya violacea in a lathe house built by his father in the back yard of their home in Manaus, Amazon, Brazil. In his program, Luiz will review some of the most exotic Bi-foliate Cattleya species of Brazil such as C.

aclandiae, C. amethystoglossa, C. nobilior, C. violacea and C. walk-eriana. Luiz focuses on the Cattleya’s habitat, climatic conditions, and color forms but concentrates mostly on valuable practical culti-vation tips for the South Florida grower.

Luiz works full time and travels extensively. He is an aeronauti-cal engineer and has an MSc. from MIT. Luiz lives in Plantation with his wife and an extensive Cattleya collection.

Please come out to the April COS meeting to enjoy this won-derful speaker!

Speaker of the Month: Luiz Hamilton

Bifoliate Cattleyas of Brazil

The Coalition for Orchid

Species — where good

friends meet for a good

COS!

Find us at

www.cosspecies.com

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 3

To all of you who have not yet paid your annual

club dues, this is your RENEWAL NOTICE!

Your 2017 COS membership expired on December of

last year! 2018 dues are payable now.

Please make your checks payable to COS:

Individual membership: $25; Dual membership: $40;

Family membership (3 + at one address): $50.

You may also send a check to

Coalition for Orchid Species

P.O. Box 563341,

Miami, FL 33256

Or see our membership chair, Vivian Wadell, at the

next meeing and she will cheerfully accept your annu-

al dues. And we thank you for supporting COS!

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 4

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 5

Remember, we are a SPECIES society and we ask

you only bring orchid species for our silent auction,

not hybrids. If you want to bid on an orchid, please

decide how much you are willing to pay, bid that

amount and then we kindly ask that you not hover

around the table, so others may also take a look at

the plants that are being offered for bid.

You must be a member to sell orchids at the

silent auction.

Advertisers Wanted! Want to advertise your business in the COS

newsletter? COS offers great rates for publishing your company

business card in the newsletter each month. See Bill Capps or

Melanie Trexler for more information!

Newsletter Additions! Have an orchid-related announcement?

Have a fun or interesting personal story to tell about your trials and

tribulations growing orchids in South Florida? Have a great orchid

travel tale to tell? Send it to one of the newsletter editors by the

first of the month, and we may add it to the next COS newsletter

if space allows!

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 6

Dear Members and Guests,

One of the ways our society raises money to fund

all the activities of our club is with the plant raffle. We

use the money to help put food on our snack table, help

purchase the end-of-year Holiday plants for our mem-

bers, help pay for the meeting room, and provide plants

for our displays at the major orchid festivals.

Please think of all the wonderful activities our club

provides and do not pass up our raffle table! Your do-

nation helps in every possible way. At one dollar per

ticket, you could win a plant worth much much more!

In addition to the orchid you may win, your donation

helps to keep our club alive, for everyone’s enjoyment.

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 7

2018 Board and Committee Members

Officers:

President: Carlos Segrera

1st Vice Pres: Katria Whitfield

2nd Vice Pres: Erna Maxwell

Treasurer: Melana Davison

Secretary: Lou Lodgya

Committees:

Newsletter Editor : Melanie Trexler/ William Capps

Membership: Vivian Waddell

Raffle: Carmen Segrera

Silent Auction: Cynthia White

Photography: Carmen Segrera/ William Capps

AOS Rep: Lynn Corson

Roster: Melana Davison

Webpage Liaison: Melanie Trexler

Refreshments: Lorraine Lee

Advertising/Reporter : TBD

Trustees: Michele De Bianchi, Juraj Kojs,

Cynthia White, and Javier Morejon

Coal i t ion for Orchid Species Apri l 2018 Page 8

ITEMS FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION

Name badges and COS lanyards will soon be available for

members!

Paper name tags will be available at each meeting for

guests;

COS polo shirts will soon be for sale!

Please submit your ideas for fundraising to Carlos Segrera

or any COS board member—your ideas are valuable!

Have any orchid books you would like to donate to COS?

We no longer keep a physical library, as many books are

now available digitally. We can, however, accept orchid-

related books to sell as part of our fundraising efforts.

Remember to be counted at each monthly meeting so that

you can earn that Holiday orchid at the end of the year!

Please consider bringing a

snack item or drink to the

meeting in April: the more

goodies, the better! Bonus: if

you bring a snack, you will get

one free raffle ticket— how

wonderful!

Apri l 2018

May 18, 19, 20, 2018

9:00am - 5:00pm

Fruit & Spice Park

24801 SW 187th Ave.

Homestead, Florida 33031

Sales—Over 60 vendors from around the world make the Redland Festival one-of-a-kind. Shop for those rare orchids you had only dreamed of finding. Updated vendor list coming in February.

Judging—The Redland Orchid Festival is an AOS judged event. Entries will be received at the Show Tent in the park on Thursday May 17th between Noon and 3:00 p.m. Judging be-gins at 3:00 p.m.

Classes—Our renowned lecture series taps into the vast knowledge of visiting orchid grow-ers from around the world to present topics of interest to all orchid collectors. All lectures are free.

For more information, http://www.redlandorchidfest.org/

Don’t miss this amazing local event!