Wall Calendars! or Christmas and Other Holiday Gift Ideas Featuring Florida's Orchids - Part 2

Wall calendars are always a great way to share beautiful photographs of Florida's wild orchids with loved ones.  Proceeds go to helping our continued efforts to keep up our educational websites and add additional material, taken from numerous field trips per year to observe and photograph orchids in the wild all over the state of Florida.  This effort is entirely funded from our pockets and from proceeds from merchandise sales and speaker fees when giving presentations at orchid societies, etc.  Our websites are free to use and continue to be a source of education and advocacy for our native orchids.  I regularly receive e-mails from folks who find orchids in the wild and request identification. We also regularly donate photos for use in educational displays, orchid society newsletters, and educational websites.

So far, we have never had any advertising on our blog or website, and that is what we continue to hope to do into the future.

We have four different calendars to choose from this year. Clicking an image below will take you to the on-line store where those calendars are available. Each calendar is $19.99 plus applicable taxes and shipping.

First up, we have our most popular calendar to date, the Florida's Endangered Orchids calendar, featuring 12 photographs of orchids from Florida's endangered orchid list, including the rare, elusive and famous Ghost Orchid.

Next, we have our highly prized "Orchids of Peninsular Florida" calendar, featuring native and naturalized species found growing in the central to southern portions of our state.

Next, we have our original and very popular calendar, updated for 2016 - Florida's Native Orchids, featuring many orchids photographed in northern Florida.

Finally, we have our second ever calendar release, Florida's Wild Orchids, also updated for 2016. This calendar features twelve new photos of orchid species ranging throughout the state, including one naturalized species, the Soldier or Lawn Orchid.

We wish you a joyous Advent season from Florida's Native and Naturalized Orchids.

Christmas and Other Holiday Gift Ideas Featuring Florida's Orchids - Part 1

The Holiday season is upon us, and while you could purchase all sorts of things for your loved ones from Ugly Christmas Ties to a Shark Laser Pointer, you can better show your loved ones you care about them (and the environment) by purchasing products featuring Florida's lovely native orchids. Proceeds from the sale of these products go toward orchid and native plant conservation efforts, as well as upkeep on our myriad websites educating folks on our natural treasures here in Florida.

These products are assembled here in America through our product distributor, Cafe Press.

So, for the next few posts over the next few days, we will be featuring gift ideas that we have put together featuring my award-winning photography of Florida's native and naturalized orchids.

First up, we have a number of products that we have commissioned featuring Florida's iconic orchid, the Butterfly Orchid (Encyclia tampensis).  It is one of the most commonly seen orchids from central to southern Florida, growing happily on various hardwoods, conifers, and even the occasional palm tree.

Click on the picture below to visit our Cafe Press shop featuring all sorts of products (t-shirts, pajamas, sweatshirts, hoodies, calendars, bumper stickers, gift cards, etc) graced with one of our most lovely orchid species:

A Compendium of American Orchids

FTD has put together an awesome graphic showing a number of orchid genera and how they are related to each other.  As you may know, the Orchid Family (Orchidaceae) is the largest plant family, consisting of some 25,000 different species.  The orchids are also incredibly diverse in size, shape, color, etc., with flowers ranging from microscopic to the size of dinner plates.

Within this very large group of plants, we find a number of Subfamilies, Tribes and Subtribes, that link together plants with similar characteristics--both plant and flower structure.  

This can be quite confusing to many, so the graphic FTD has produced really helps to visualized the linkages between these different types of orchids.  Here it is, in all its glory:

Produced by FTD.com.

Be sure to click on the image to visit the FTD blog site.

Winners of the 2015 Florida Wildflower Photography Contest Announced

The winners of this year's Florida Wildflower Photography Contest have been announced, and one of my photos took Honorable Mention (effectively third place).  

Here is my award-winning photo:

Thank you to everyone for voting for this photo during the public vote phase of the contest.  Here is the link to see all the winners:

Florida Wildflower Photography Contest 2015 

Recent Speaking Engagement - Volusia County Orchid Society

I recently spoke at the Volusia County Orchid Society on August 19th, 2015.  Thank you so much to the society for hosting me.

Recent Speaking Engagement - Treasure Coast Orchid Society, Vero Beach, FL

I spoke on Tuesday, August 4 at 7PM, at the Treasure Coast Orchid Society in Vero Beach, FL, giving my new, highly acclaimed presentation on Florida's Endangered Orchids - a survey of some of our rarer orchids, their habits, habitat, and current status. The society's web site can be found here:

http://mytcos.org/

The address for the meeting was:

Indian River Garden Center, 2526 17th Avenue, Vero Beach, Fl 32960

Orange Fringed Orchid (Platanthera ciliaris) in Bloom

Here is a video I shot recently in north-central Florida showing the Orange (Yellow) Fringed Orchid (Platanthera ciliaris) in full bloom.  It is the first of 16 videos I have on my channel depicting our native orchids.

Recent Speaking Engagement - Martin County Orchid Society on July 23, 2015 at 7:00 PM

I recently gave my new presentation "Florida's Endangered Orchids" at this society meeting--a discussion of some of Florida's rarest orchids: their habitat, their present status, and what is being done to protect them.

The presentation was very well received.