Every year at the International Aroid Society show in September we have a great Cuban dinner on Saturday evening. This year the show will be on September 18 and 19th with the dinner on the evening of the 18th. Our guest speaker will be Dr. Scott Mori from the New York botanical Garden and his talk will be on the preservation of the rain forests. Scott's wife is an incredible photographer so we expect a stellar presentation
We would enjoy having any of you attend. You can make your reservations and pay the $25 by visiting the IAS website www.Aroid.org. Just click on the information about this year's show.
An additional reminder, prominent Dave's garden members LariAnn Garner and Scott Wade will be featured speakers on Saturday afternoon. Their talks will be specifically aimed at growing aroids and you will go home with a ton of new information. LariAnn has titled her presentation The Most Popular plants You Never Heard Of. I have seen a preview and this one is going to be great.
Scott is going to give an explanation of why understanding some botanical terminology is important. I often fear that people will constantly be afraid of words that look difficult but am certain Scott will help you understand why they are important.
I welcome both of them to give you more details regarding their talks. We really want you to attend.
Following their talks Dr. Tom Croat of the Missouri botanical garden will give two short talks with one explaining how to use the Royal botanical garden Kew computer system to key out species plants using only you can gather directly by observing the specimen.
I have taken this brief course once and will be glad to have the chance to listen to it again this makes figuring out what plant you're growing much easier. It is not difficult to master the basics!
The show is held at the Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden in Miami.
Steve
The International Aroid Show and sale dinner.
Poi!
Hey Steve, can you keep us far-awayaners informed. Photos & such.
Mahalo a nui!
I'll gladly post photos once we all get home. There is a series of announcements in the works right now and I'll post them as they are received.
Sure wish you could be with us Dave! It is always great fun seeing old friends and meeting new ones not counting all the plants my wife will refuse to allow me to buy!
Steve
Thanks Steve!
Wish I could be there, but responsibility & finances keep me here.
Will be looking forward to seeing photos from the event!
Man, I sure wish I could be there, too. Probably next year.
All our members would love to have all the aroiders on Dave's come to the show. We realize the IAS sometimes appears to be a group of super serious growers and scientists but our immediate goal is to make the organization friendly to the average grower. There are discussions that will take place at our September board meeting to address just that including ways to help growers better ID plants and look up common names to find the most closely related species name.
All suggestions are welcome so please post them here or drop me a PM. Tell me what you would like to see the IAS become in order to make it useful to you!
If any of you will be in the Miami area during the Sept. 18 and 19 weekend come visit us. We'll have lots of large plants on display along with some very useful programs you can attend for free not counting all the vendors that will have plants available for you to take home!
Steve
Hey Steve!
How about an IAS meeting in Hilo and tour of Hawai'i Island!
I would vote for that, and so would my wife if I can figure out how to pay for it.
We have been looking for IAS members in Hawaii for over a year willing to band together and create a chapter. There is a reasonable number of IAS members in the islands but the majority of collectors there appear not to have a desire to be a part of this type of organization. I have contacted several in an effort to put together a chapter like the one in northern California and the one we have in MidAmerica (Missouri, Kansas, Illinois, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas and other neighboring states. We meet four times a year and the meetings rotate through a variety of botanical gardens. We have an excellent turn out and each meeting grows.
If you can help to organize a chapter there I will help with all the material you need as well as the promotion in the IAS Newsletter, our journal and email. I am told there are some incredible private aroid collections in Hawaii!
Steve
The Palm Society is probably the most popular garden club here, but it tends to be a rich folks club, being that many of the choice desired specimens are expensive to place in a garden.
Aroids are a lot of fun as they are easy to propagate, easy to grow, and a simple field trip on Hawai'i Island can result in dozens of cuttings of a wide variety of wild Aroids, found on the roadside.
The wide variety of Philodendron growing by the wayside here makes me dizzy! I have yet to figure out all of the species!
I would be glad to form an IAS chapter here. I have been long involved in groups that promote native plants. Hawai'i Island tends to be an oasis for rare tropical plants. Available habitat here ranges from sea level to alpine, wet and boggy to dry desert.
Hawai'i Island seems to have a place that makes everybody happy!
I will gladly help you to do it. Do we have other Dave's Garden members from the islands that are aroiders?
My wife will be the first in line to want to come "collect plants", along with a bunch of other things!
Steve
I will be down for the show. I have a lot of traveling to do and hope to be their early if possible. See everyone at the show.
Bravo Rachel! She has become active in our MidAmerica IAS Chapter and I enjoy knowing her. Chapters turn names into faces and faces into friends. I believe that many of us that write on forums like this one can become very good friends were we to just be able to meet each other.
If any of you are interested in meeting other aroid growers just drop me a note.
I would love to be able to meet as many of you as possible and will gladly put you in touch with other aroid growers listed on the IAS member rolls.
Steve
I hope the midamerica aroid group can come up with a website or added page to the aroid site. If it is not already. I would like to make it out to St Louis or have a meeting here at our nursery or visit Steve's place. Either way a place to post updates and calendar events could be very useful especially for me it seems I have to plan ahead for everything now days.
Brian, let's talk about this in Miami. There are are enough members now in the Chicago, Ohio and surrounding areas to begin work on a group in your area and if the response is anything like it is in the MidAmerica chapter you guys can really take off any fly. We do plant exchanges, have some excellent talks and every meeting is larger than the last.
Our next MidAmerica meeting will be at the Fort Worth Botanical Garden on Halloween! I believe Dr. Croat will be there and I will for sure. We also have a new contingent of members coming up from the Houston area and Dr. Nancy Greig from the Houston Museum of Natural Science will be in the lead.
I was contacted yesterday about the possibility of establishing a chapter in Australia so we are looking for members and volunteers there. I would really like to see an IAS chapter in Hawaii so Dave we can talk about one here or privately, your choice. There are so many growers in the islands that will benefit from just knowing each other.
I am convinced it is easier to take the IAS to the home areas of the members than to bring all the members to Miami. I have no desire to not have the Miami meeting because it is a great excuse for me to guy buy some plants, not counting the fact we lived in Miami for over 20 years and have lots of friends.
If any of you are interested in forming a chapter in your area or attending one of our meetings please post it or drop me a PM. It is obvious there are tons of aroid lovers right here in Dave's Garden so just thing how much fun we can all have getting together around the country.
For any of you lucky enough to live in Florida, please consider meeting with us at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden in Miami on September 18 and 19. You don't have to be an IAS member to attend! We just enjoy meeting fellow aroiders!
See you in less than 3 weeks Rachael!
Steve
PS: I've seen a preview of LariAnn's Saturday, Sept. 18 presentation and this one is going to be good! Plan to be there and meet her!
I failed to say it but Brian, you can come here to see my collection anytime. I have plants from you that are growing very large and I'd love to talk with you about them.........for about three days! If I can talk Janice into a drive east we'll be up to see your plants as well!
We tell people all the time they are welcome to come visit us and the fall is great because there are still plants producing inflorescences and the plants are big and lush right now. Never a charge to get in the atrium, just call us in advance. My email and phone number are right on the homepage: www.ExoticRainforest.com
Steve and Brian, I am looking forward to meeting you this year at the IAS function at Fairchild. I could not make it last year, but I am definitely making it there this year. I got my copy of Aroideana yesterday and have already begun reading it. Granted, 2/3 of it is over my head, but it's such a joy to come across something that I'm familiar with!
Take good care.
Marianne
Marianne, we too will be delighted to get to see you! Try my article in the back of the book. Still a bit technical but it is at least a list of definitions to help make understanding the really technical articles easier.
Well, that was my goal anyway!
We leave tomorrow so you guys have fun!
Steve
Steve and Brian, it was such a pleasure to meet you both at the IAS Show and sale. I do wish you would use your influence and suggest a holding area for plants and having schedules of talks, etc. on hand. It's such a shame to have so few people sit in on them after the speakers have done so much to prepare them. I had to leave after hearing LariAnn because I did not want my purchased plants to take up space in the vendor's area any longer. There's an art to packing my car with as many plants as I tend to buy and not wanting to have to unload and reload or leave them in a steaming car all afternoon, I left to come back to Fort Myers without attending the dinner. I really wanted to stay, but could not risk having the $600 worth of plants I'd purchased burn in the car! Though this may sound like a complaint, it's really just a suggestion. I had a wonderful time!
Take good care.
Marianne Visco
Steve, it was great meeting you.
Brian, I looked all over for you.
Maybe next year this DG Aroid affair can be organized.
Hap (Nancy Lee)
Hap, I did not know you were going; wish I'd met you as well! Maybe next time!
Marianne
The pleasure was all mine! I would have loved to have had the time to sit and talk with each of you for at least an hour but as you saw the show was very hectic. The recommendation to have an area to hold plants is an excellent one and I think that can be arranged provided the air conditioned room we could use is not otherwise in use.
If you will send a personal note to me in that regard I will send it directly to all the other board members. We are always looking for ways to help serve our members so these kinds of recommendations are very valuable! The same request goes out to everyone. If there is a reason you have chosen not to join, please send me a private note! If you have an idea for the IAS, send both Brian and myself a note!
Next year, we hope many more aroiders from Dave's Garden will take us up on the invitation to be there. I saw plants go for a "song" in some cases and I believe I actually picked up another brand new unknown species from Ecuagenera. Dr. Croat is spending the night with us in just over a month so I'll know more then!
You never know what you can find at the IAS show! One thing you'll find for certain is a bunch of new friends!
Steve
Any pictures of the event?
Working on them. I had two large capacity flash drives and one appers to be completely corrupted but I've got a friend working on it. I'll see what I can find on the other worth posting.
Steve
Yes Dieffenbachia camouflage was it's name. I though this was a wonderful plant however their were some much more unusual and rarely seen aroids there but all the judges have to agree for it to get the award. It was in perfect shape and very nice but a bit more common.
Thanks Brian and I agree, it is a nice looking Dieff. but I was surprised it took the blue ribbon. I viewed some extraordinarily beautiful Philodendrons and I am sure there were alot of other aroids that would have equally made my mouth drop too. I hope you were able to bring home some new plants for your own collection.
Nice photo!
Anyone have photo links to their website of this event or movies posted on youtube?