Palomar Orchid Society

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Palomar Orchid Society

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The Palomar Orchid Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting the understanding and cultivation of both hybrid and species orchids.

The Palomar Orchid Society, incorporated in December of 1965 and now based in Carlsbad, CA, was formed when a few people banded together to talk about orchids. We then grew and bloomed into the roughly 200-member group of orchid enthusiasts that we have today. We represent everything orchid in North San Diego County! Come and join us!! The Palomar Orchid Society meets at 6:30 pm the FIRST WEDNESDAY of every month at the Gowland Meeting Room of the Carlsbad City Library (see http://www.palomarorchid.org/content/george-and-patricia-gowland-meeting-room.html)

10/22/2026

The San Diego County Orchid Society's Fall Orchid Show and Sale takes place this weekend at Balboa Park. Event includes a juried show, vendor sales, and more. For details, visit https://sdorchids.com/up-coming-show/. See you there!

10/06/2026

The 10th Annual Huntington Orchid Show and Sale will take place this weekend. A beautiful show in a beautiful location. Admission to show is included with general admission ticket to library. Go to huntington.org/orchid-show for details. Don't miss it!

10/05/2026

Guest Speaker Lou Jost will speak at our general meeting at 4 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 7 at the Pine Avenue Community Center Activity Room 108, 3209 Harding St. Carlsbad, CA

We are pleased to welcome Lou Jost, at our meeting on Wednesday, who will be sharing his talk "Adventures in Discovering, Describing, and Protecting New Andean Orchid Species". Ecuador is the richest country in the world for orchids. During his 30 years there, Lou explored remote mountains and jungles, searching for new orchid species. He will talk about this search, particularly focused on miniatures, especially Lepanthes, one of the most diverse genera of orchids. He will feature some of the more than sixty new species he discovered, not only miniature orchids, but also big Sobralias and Maxillarias and spectacular new trees, a couple of amaryllis relatives, and others. He'll also talk about the task of ensuring that these new discoveries survive in the wild, and how he and his friends protected the mountains where most of these discoveries were located.

Lou is a shared speaker with the San Diego County Orchid Society and will be giving his talk "Why are Orchids so Diverse? Clues from the Distribution of Andean Miniatures" on Tuesday, October 6th in Balboa Park. You can watch his talk on Zoom (contact Barry Reder or Alex Nadzan at [email protected] for the link) or in person at Casa Del Prado,
room 101.

Lou was born in Wisconsin and did graduate work in physics at the University of Texas. After a couple of years of that, he fell in love with the tropics and worked odd jobs to finance long trips to the forests of Mexico, Costa Rica, and eventually Ecuador where he settled down. He co-founded Fundacion EcoMinga in 2006 to protect the orchids and other species that he discovered. During that time he also revolutionized how ecologists quantify biodiversity, and fixed some foundational errors in population genetics, thanks to his training in mathematics.

This month’s plant table will consist of orchids from Ontario Orchids and 808 Orchids Kalapana

09/17/2026

Come to our society orchid fundraiser this Saturday, September 19 from 10am-2pm at the Carlsbad City (Dove) Library. We will have a large variety of blooming and unbloomed orchids from Sunset Valley Orchids, Andy's Orchids, Ontario Orchids, 808 Orchids Kalapana as well as several from our own members for sale at good prices. Come early for the best selection. Representative pics of some of the orchids for sale are shown below.

09/10/2026

Don't miss Andy's Orchids Fall Open House taking place this weekend! https://andysorchids.com

09/04/2026

Join us at our annual orchid sale, which will take place on Saturday, September 19 at the Dove Library in Carlsbad, CA from 10 am - 2 pm. Members will be on hand to answer questions about orchid care and cultivation or to help you choose the perfect orchid for your growing environment. Great prices and a great selection of plants - Cattleyas, Dendrobiums, Phalaenopsis, and more! Don't miss it!

08/31/2026

Alan Koch “Modern Trends for the Cattleya Grower”
Wednesday, September 2, 2026 at the Pine Avenue Community Center, 3209 Harding St., Carlsbad, CA 4 p.m.

This month we are excited to welcome back Alan Koch, who will be sharing his talk “Modern Trends for the Cattleya Grower”, where he will be covering what’s new in Cattleyas around the world.

Alan is a shared speaker with the San Diego County Orchid Society and will be givinghis talk “Mini Vandaceous Species and Hybrids for the Home Grower” on Tuesday, September 1 at 6:30pm in Balboa Park. You can watch his talk on Zoom (contact Barry Reder or Alex Nadzan at [email protected] for the link) or in person at Casa Del Prado,room 101.

Alan Koch owns and operates Gold Country Orchids where he specializes in miniature and compact Cattleyas along with other miniature species. Alan started growing orchids in
1969 with three Cymbidiums given to him by an aunt. While in college he became interested in other orchids and dis-
covered many would grow outdoors in Southern California. He has moved five times as his orchid obsession has led
to the need for more growing space. With the last move, he purchased 10 acres of land in Lincoln, California for his
250,000 orchids.

Alan is recognized as an expert in the Brazilian Cattleya alliance and a trend setter in miniature and compact Cattleya breeding. Alan has been published in the Orchid Digest, the American Orchid Society magazine, as well as many international publications. He also has been published in several proceedings of the World Orchid Conference.

He is an internationally known speaker who was pleased to be the keynote speaker for the 2025 Asia Pacific Orchid
Conference in Taiwan. He is a past member of the AOS Judging Committee and Research Committee, as well as an
Emeritus Judge, and is Training Coordinator for the California Sierra Nevada Judging Center. Alan also served two
terms on the Orchid Digest Executive Committee and three terms on the Board of Directors, as well as two terms as a
Trustee for the AOS. He was the First Vice President for the International Phalaenopsis Alliance for three terms. Alan is
also well known for the many AOS auctions he has done.

08/03/2026

August Speaker: Jack Zhu: “An Adventure in Asian Cymbidium’s Natural Habitat”
Carlsbad Senior Center, 799 Pine Ave., Carlsbad, CA
Wednesday, August 5, 2026 at 5:00 p.m.

This month we're happy to welcome back Jack Zhu, who will present "“An Adventure in Asian Cymbidium’s Natural Habitat” recounting his recent trip to Eastern China. During the journey, Jack and his tour guide ventured into the wild to explore the natural habitat of Asian Cymbidiums. Jack will share insights on the local weather conditions, forest trees, and companion plants found in these areas.

Jack is a shared speaker with the San Diego County Orchid Society and he will be giving the same talk on Tuesday, August 4th at 6:30pm. You can watch his talk on Zoom (contact Alex or Barry for the link) or in person at the Casa Del Prado in Balboa Park, room 101.

Jack Zhu is a prominent orchid cultivator, commercial nursery owner, and an accredited American Orchid Society (AOS) Judge within the Pacific South Judging Region. As the founder of Fang Hua Garden, he specializes in the importation, preservation, and curation of diverse Asian orchid genera, with a particular focus on Asian Cymbidiums (Guolan) and Paphiopedilums. Deeply immersed in the rich cultural history and traditional aesthetics of traditional orchid appreciation, Jack has successfully bridged Eastern horticultural standards with Western judging paradigms, garnering more than forty AOS awards for his exceptional Asian Cymbidiums.

Jack will be supplying the opportunity table this month.

07/21/2026

San Diego County Orchid Society's Summer Show and Sale takes place next weekend. Event includes a juried show, vendor sales, and more. Visit sdorchids.com for all the details. See you there!

06/29/2026

Dr. Kay Klausing on ‘Orchid Viruses: Practical Tips for the Hobbyist’ General Meeting, Wednesday, July 1 at 5:00 p.m.

This month we are pleased to welcome back Kay Klausing, PhD who will be sharing his talk, 'Orchid Viruses: Practical Tips for the Hobbyist'. His talk is an updated version of a presentation that he has given many times over the years. He has virus tested his entire collection and will present the results and the implications of what he found alongside what he has learned from literature - focusing on what might be useful to other orchid hobbyists.

Kay is a Virologist/Molecular Biologist/Biochemist (PhD in Molecular Genetics) originally from Germany. He moved to San Diego for his postdoctoral work at UCSD and continued to stay working for various biotech companies including 15 years for Illumina as his longest stint. He has recently co-founded his own company along with 2 other fellow Ex-Illumina veterans.

His interest in orchid viruses stems from the experimental work of his Master’s and PhD theses, which was done using a monkey virus (SV40) as a model system to study eukaryotic DNA replication. As a Virologist, he been fascinated by the strategies these “DNA parasites” have evolved to enslave their hosts for the sole purpose of multiplying.

As long as he can remember, Kay had an interest in growing plants alongside keeping reptiles and amphibians. He has a large collection of orchids (>1000 plants), which he has been growing for 45 years. In fact, one of the first things he bought after moving to the US — even before a car, remarkable in Southern California — was an orchid at the POS orchid show. He also grows quite a few other types of plants including carnivorous plants, cycads, bromeliads, ferns, palms, succulents, and pachypodiums. Kay was on the board for the San Diego County Orchid Society for many years including serving as president.

This month’s opportunity will be provided by Max Yang of Vista Orchids.

Address

3209 Harding Street
Carlsbad, CA
92008

Website

http://www.palomarorchid.org/

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