Searching for Bromeliads
You will feel like you should be wearing your sturdy, dusty hiking boots at the December Membership Meeting on December 2 , featuring speaker Dennis Cathcart. Always the dreamer and adventurer, he started Tropiflora in the early ’70s as an outgrowth of a bromeliad collecting hobby. A “hobby gone bad” he says. Following years of collecting reptiles and traveling the Caribbean and Latin America, he discovered bromeliads or they discovered him and the direction of his life was changed for evermore. Collecting and exploring were always his first interests in the plant world and for over 35 years he and his wife, Linda, have visited over 27 countries on more than 100 trips and expeditions. Together they have made travel, adventure, plant exploring, speaking, writing and the nursery business a way of life.
Join with us in this vicarious travel with Dennis in the Buehler Auditorium of the Naples Botanical Garden at 1:00 p.m. We will explore remote areas of the world seeking new and varied species of rare and exotic plants featuring bromeliads including orchids and Tillandsias. Three species of bromeliads, an Aechmia, a Neoreglia and a Vriesea carry the specific epithet cathcartii. Dennis has traveled to many places including Australia, New Zealand, Venezuela, Java, Thailand and Singapore for speaking engagements. We are fortunate to have him speak at our Garden Club meeting.
Also, Dennis has agreed to present a demonstration workshop in the morning. See Deck the Halls with Tillandsias and Bromeliads in this issue of Trowel Prints. Some of those arrangements will be presented for our Raffle after the General meeting. In addition, plants from Tropiflora Nursery will be included in the Raffle. Finally, many plants will be for sale on the breezeway, after the general meeting, on the way to refreshments in the Windstar Room.