nope...we changed out 2 beds today.They have about 50 beds that were planted with Poinsettia and have to be changed now that the holiday is over.I was well dressed but still a mucky mess..especially now that I have to wear glasses!...I actually gave my notice today..I LOVE the job...I love ( most of) the folks I work with but my old body can't do the heavy lifting that my brain can do! The most difficult part is taking an hour lunch break ( at 9 am) and then getting back into manual labor..my back is saying NOOOOOOO! They do have a large orchid house , with someone who is allegedly in charge. She is quite passionate about having someone potting up keikie's..but lets huge specimen plants die. I went through the orchid house the other day and tossed at least a dozen plants like this in the trash. . . and got a talking to...she's not interested in blooms or culture ...just the keikeis...


this was an 18" hanging basket.
so today I just picked the dead leaves off of plants and positioned budding and blooming plants so I could enjoy them on my lunch breaks

How sad that she doesn't display the orchids properly. I think all botanical gardens should be educational that means showing the best cultural practices. I don't blame you for giving notice.

I totally understand, Lindsey!
Maybe somebody in that Orchid department needs an expert....

That is just sad!

Oh, that huge dead orchid just breaks my heart! Too bad your job didn't work out, Lindsey. I sympathize with the aching back, too. I did too much pruning and weeding at the school garden yesterday and have been trying to un-cramp mine since then.

Well, I, for one, am glad my friend Lindsey is not out in the street at 3 AM and not doing heavy labor in the cold and rain. Something will surely come along that is better than that.

Jim

All the bending and lifting aside, it's the hours that would have killed me on that job.

Same here!

Thanks for all the support!
Alice , Busch Gardens is not really a garden..but a huge amusement park that
Happens to have earned numerous landscaping awards over the years.
Ursula, they definitely need an orchid expert there...but they don't recognize that there is a problem in the orchid house. The orchid house is where they go to get their coffee, warm up and have a cigarette. I'm the only one that looks at the plants!

Please don't tell me that they SMOKE in the orchid house. Don't they know what mosaic virus is?

Hmm, that's an interesting idea, but wouldn't cigarette smoke be essentially sterile? The tobacco is burned before it is released. Orchids are really good at cleaning the air, too.

Still, it's a shame that's all their orchid house is being used for. Isn't there someone you could alert about this? Just maybe diplomatically mentioning to the boss that some very valuable orchids (that huge one would have sold for hundreds of dollars) have been let die, and you think the person in charge there is not qualified to care for orchids? What are they doing with all the keikis anyway? Selling them?

Busch Gardens does have wonderful gardens, and a really great zoo, too. But sady, you can't go in just to see those things without paying the outrageous entry fee for the amusement park.

It is not so much the smoke (though even that cold carry the virus.......I don't know). It is simply having the fingers touch the cigarettes and transferring the mosaic virus from that tobacco to the plants.

We visited Busch Gardens probably 25 years ago and I remember the beauty of the place. I don't remember an orchid house though. I only had a handful of orchids back then and would not have been terribly interested in orchids.

Around here my Cattleya trianae var. amoena is now in bloom.

Amusement Park or not, they should still be demonstrating good cultural practices. Disney does or at least they portend to with their hort weeks and classes.

That is a gorgeous Catt., Ursula. I love the white Catt. species/hybrids.

Ken..the mosaic virus is the least of the problems...one morning I smelled propane when I walked in...so I opened both doors to vent the house..someone came in and lit a cigarette..I told him about the propane smell and he stood there for a minute then put the lit cigarette behind his back...like that would hide it from the gas...I left the building! The greenhouses are on the edge of the park out of view of any guests.
Elaine, the babies are potted up and then ( I guess ) left to die.. I did try to be diplomatic in mentioning it to the boss..but some people need to be hit over the head...
Alice they do an outstanding job of growing their annuals to maturity...getting them as tiny plugs. Each tray has 10 plants in it..only occasionally do I find an empty spot where a plant used to be. Their program of watering, fertilizing and fungus sprays is working really well for them.
Ursula, your Cattleya trianae var. amoena is gorgeous! I love the blush on the lip..and the flowers look HUGE!

Really just lovely - puts me in mind of a young debutante in a frilly white dress, and just a blush of pink lipstick?

Raining cats and dogs here right now, and I'm not complaining. We've had very little rain in the last few weeks.

We cross-posted, Lindsey. You getting some rain?

The rain has moved on and now we have blue skies. I am hunkering down for the polar blast in two days.

We did get some welcome rain...even the weeds that make up most of my 'lawn' were beginning to look stressed.
Today will be moving day as the next 3 nights will be in the 40's here.

Pouring buckets here! And temps will climb to 60 degr F for a few hours. I am happy it isn't a blizzard, more normal for this time of year.

Lindsey, perhaps eventually you might add some poles of sort to your benches so you can throw some plastic over the set up? Btw traffic sign mounts sell fairly cheaply, they have pre drilled holes to connect them in many ways. Klaus used those green ones to repair the ceiling of my cage after it had collapsed under the snow load a couple of years ago.
https://trafficsignstore.com/p...
There should be a local store to pick some up. For about a 100$ one could imagine some contraption around the benches.
Just an idea.....