Bromelcairns Bimonthly Newsletter of Cairns Bromeliad Societ Inc. 2011 # 2 P.O. Box 28 Cairns Queensland 4870 Austalia President Dave Weston 0740578604 V-President Karen Stevens 0740361086 Secretary Lynn Hudson 0740533913 Treasurer Monica Stapleton 0740331330 Librarian Maria Grant 0740370161 Editor Lynn Hudson 0740533913 Editor Assist. Moyneen Charlton 0740337390 Member Concierge Nalda Wilson 0740544825 Popular Vote Steward Brendan Leishman 0740578604 OIC Raffles Karen Stevens 0740361086 *Honorary Life Member - Grace Goode O.A.M.* Life Member - Lynn Hudson Life Member - Robert (Bob) Hudson ******************************************************************** Aims of the Society Promote and Develop Interest in Bromeliads through Friendship To Co-operate with similar Clubs throughout the World ******************************************************************** Membership Fee: $15 Single, $25 Family, Country Member $25. $7.50 junior (if not in family membership) Meetings start at 1.pm sharp first Saturday of the month. Please bring a cup and a chair. Library: All books & magazines borrowed are to be returned in good order to the following meeting. If not on wait list, they may be rebooked. Plant Display/Sales: To participate, a member must be financial and circumstances permitting, have attended at least three meetings in the past six months. Where the society is charged a stall fee - 20% of sales are deducted for club funds. No charge venue & meetings - 10% of sales is deducted. All plants to be clean, free of disease, named and price tagged. Show Plants: Must be the property of and in the custody of the entrant for the past three months. For Society Shows the entrant must be financial and have attended at least three meetings during the past six months. Pens, Plant Tags & Pots: available at each meeting. If reprinting article, wholly or in part, please acknowledge Author & Newsletter. Any article will be Emailed on request to [email protected] 2 Club Actvites & Around te Members March: This month we met at Whitfield Retirement Village, where we can once again enjoy the hall, air conditioning and the beautiful garden. It is a credit to Mary & Barry to have achieved so much for everyone’s enjoyment. * Whilst the never ending rain gave everything a good drink, the pool filled and the gunge from the bottom floated to the top. Barry thought it was a good chance to get it out - Mary donned her togs and sent it to the edge where Barry found he was retrieving icky smelly stuff and decided maybe it was not such a good idea!! It is gone now Barry - until next time! * Members enjoyed Brendan’s interesting talk on Pitcairnias (see page 4). My Macbook would not turn on so he could not give his prepared powerpoint presentation. Sorry Bren, next time. MINI SHOW – Flowering Bromeliad, any genera 1st. Tillandsia ionantha ! Bob Hudson 2nd Tillandsia ionantha ! Marguerite Sexton! 3rd Tillandsia streptophylla! Judith Walsh POPULAR VOTE: NOVICE: Bromeliad!! ! ! ! ! 1st Neoregelia chlorosticta F2!! Bernice Mark 2nd. Neoregelia ‘Amazing Grace’! John Mark 3rd. Neoregelia ‘Purple Star’!! John Mark Cryptanthus - nil entries Tillandsia 1st. Tillandsia streptophylla!! Judith Walsh 2nd. Tillandsia cyanea!! ! Frances Boyd OPEN: Bromeliad 1st. Neoregelia ‘Enchanment’ ! Beryl Watson 2nd Hohenbergia leopoldo horstii !Maria Grant! ! 3rd. Canistrum fosterianum !! Maria Grant Cryptanthus !! ! ! 1st. Cryptanthus ‘Ruby‘ ! Marguerite Sexton! 2nd. Cryptanthus ’San Juan’ !! Lynn Hudson 3rd. Cryptanthus Hybrid!! ! Karen Cross Tillandsia 1st. Tillandsia ionantha ‘Fuego’ Marguerite Sexton 2nd. Tillandsia ‘Fuego’! ! Bob Hudson 3rd. Tillandsia ‘Druid‘ ! Lynn Hudson !!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 Club Actvites & Around te Members APRIL: We drove up the Kuranda Range then to Biboohra to Bernice & John Mark’s property. All the way was lush and green, as was their property. I could fully understand why Bernice says she just hates leaving the place. It is quiet and tranquil, they should set it up as a B&B, it would be wonderful to recouperate there. If you got bored you could wander over to the shade houses where you would be enthralled by the bromeliads. They are a mass of colour and the picture of perfection, just beautiful. Member numbers were down to 18 as for varied reasons, some could not make the trip. Those who attended really appreciated the outing. * Dave spoke on variegations and showed some of the plants he imported from WBC19. I bet he got some good offers as they were pretty spekky. *Rob Giddins showed some of his billbergia hybrids, noting the many differences in the markings and colour from the same grex. MINI SHOW –Tillandsia !! ! 1st. Tillandsia latifolia ! Karen Stevens 2nd Tillandsia tectorum ! Bob Hudson! 3rd Tillandsia gardneri! Dave Weston Flowering Tillandsia 1st. Tillandsia ‘Bahia’ ! Bob Hudson 2nd Tillandsia ‘Roma’! Karen Stevens! 3rd Tillandsia cyanea! Marie Giddins POPULAR VOTE: NOVICE: Bromeliad 1st Aechmea ‘Samurai’ - John Mark Cryptanthus - nil entries Tillandsia – nil entries OPEN: Bromeliad 1st. Dyckia ‘Yellow Glow’ - Dave Weston 2nd Neoregelia ‘Red Tiger’ - Rob Giddins 3rd. Billbergia (‘Don Beadle’ x ‘Hoelscheriana’) - Rob Giddins! ! Cryptanthus !! ! ! ! 1st.. Cryptanthus ‘Florence Wasley’ - Lynn Hudson 2nd. Cryptanthus ‘Elaine’ -! Karen Stevens Tillandsia 1st. Tillandsia ‘Bahia‘ - Bob Hudson 2nd. Tillandsia ‘Victoria‘ - Bob Hudson 2nd. Tillandsia cyanea - Marie Giddins 4 March meeting from Moyneen A feature of our March meeting was a Brendan who took us on a trip to the dark side with his strange grass collection - only joking! He showed us a range from about a metre high to P. smithiorum that was about 30cms with very attractive orange flower bracts and yellow flowers. Another one attracting a lot of attention had lovely dark maroon stalks. He said they are at their best in swampy conditions like river banks with dappled light to shade. A downside is that sometimes the longer leaves tend to bend and spoil the effect. We were a little put off to hear about the spikes at the base of the plants. We thank him for a very informative talk and for bringing plants in for us to see. P. undulata P. andreana P. flammea P. tabuliformis Pitcairnias an overview of talk presented by Brendan Leishman I have always likes Pitcairnias and over the years have collected several species and cultivars. I think I find them so appealing because they are so different in their shape, form and inflorescence than other bromeliads. In the family of Bromeliaceae the Pitcairnia fall under the subfamily of Pitcairnioideae so are related to the other pitcairnioideae genera such as the Dyckia, Hechtia, Navia, Fosterella and Puya. The name ‘Pitcairnia’ was named for Dr William Pitcairn, an English physician who lived during 1711 – 1791 and was an avid gardener and collector of exotic and special plants. There are many species in the Pitcairnia genus totalling almost 400, plus the genus Pepinia. Primarily pitcairnia are terrestrial growers ie they grow in the ground. However there are always exceptions to the rules - at the recent Australian Bromeliad Conference in Darwin, Dennis Cathcart showed a photo of a Pitcairnia microcalyx, a species happily living and flourishing on the branch of a tree in a South American Cloud forest in Venezuela. A plant needs the appropriate food and sunlight to grow and it was able to achieve this up in a tree - amazing! Pitcairnia have a highly developed root system which they use for the uptake of nutrient and water. In the wild they live happily on rocky cliffs, along creeks and other places where they can send out roots to collect what they need to survive. Unlike other bromeliads that have trichomes on their leaves to assist in water & nutrient absorption, pitcairnia have few and therefore need to be grown with regular watering and slow release fertilizing. As well their leaves do not form a cup, for example like Neoregelia, that hold water to help keep > Pitcairnias continued ..!! ! ! 5 the plants going dry spells. Leaf blades narrow don’t collect water. The leaves are described as being dimorphic - meaning ‘variable in shape & form’. If you look closely at the base of some pitcairnia you will sometimes notice short & spiky leaves. Most leaves are long and grass like, some wide then narrowing, mostly green but some are reddish in colour, some discoloured. ! The flowers of pitcairnia are usually bright and colourful with petals of white, yellow, green & red/purple. They can be well used in landscaping in well drained positions and suit shaded positions with filtered light. They have a clumping habit and will happily spread by rhizomes and will eventually easily fill a space. There are some species such as Pitcairnia wendlandii that grow well in full sun when the conditions are right. As mentioned above for best results with pitcairnia give them a regular feeding and watering and they will reward you with a great display of foliage and flowers. In our back yards and shade houses we need to grow pitcairnia in a soft mix that we also use for other soft leaf broms such as vrieseas and guzmainias. I find that you really need to keep the water up to these plants. Due to their highly developed root system they appreciate being potted on into larger containers and once a clump gets big enough can be divided to propagate in smaller pots. Soft scale can be a problem with pitcairnia and will easily mark the leaves. Grasshoppers too will also make a meal of the leaves but only when they have a head. FACT: All bromeliads are found in the Americas apart from Pitcairnia feliciana which is the only member of the Bromeliaceae family that lives in West Africa. P. funkiae P. wendlandii P. smithiorum P. maidifolia PS. I would like to encourage other members to think about doing a short bromeliad presentation about some aspect that they find interesting as researching information the best way to inform yourself so that you can then share it with others. Brendan 6 16th Australian Bromeliad Conference 7-10t h Apr i l 2011 hosted by Northern Territory Bromeliad Society Inc.