Dracula gongora
grown by Ken Cook
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Draculas
& Masdevallias presented by
Ken Cook
Ken began growing orchids 9 years ago. After 6 months of killing nearly every plant he bought, his wife, Barbara, made the mistake of buying him the book, “Orchid Growing for Wimps” (which she promptly revised to read
”Orchid Growing for Winners”). Ken’s obsession truly began with a visit to the
Pacific Orchid Exposition. There he experienced seeing the
over- whelming beauty of massive orchid plants that had been grown by experts for over 20 years. The rest is history. After covering a western facing picture window in the dining room, Barbara declared, “You need to get a greenhouse”. To which Ken replied, “Please don’t throw me in the
briar patch”.
Intrigued by the beauty of Masdevallias, Ken asked the owner of the The Orchid Florist in Berkeley if they were as hard to grow as he had heard. Phillipe replied, “You live in El Cerrito, you can grow them on your porch!” Their relatives, Draculas, turned out to be just as happy with El Cerrito. As the porch filled up Ken tried growing them in his intermediate/cool greenhouse and found that many are happy there
too. His growing efforts have resulted in several awards from the
AOS.
So if you live East of the Hills or West of the Hills, please come and learn how to grow
these fascinating plants. They are well worth learning how to make them
happy.
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