"Robert Fuchs... orchid-draped walled garden near the Everglades... president of R. H. Orchids... Fuchs does everything theatrically... he said... he specializes in the vanda because it is probably the most flamboyant of all orchids.
... Fuchs, whose father and grandfather grew orchids in the farmlands near Homestead, was a junior high school art teacher in 1984 when... at the 11th World Orchid Conference in Miami... his... red hybrid vanda won the grand champion title at that event... he quit his day job. Today, he is... perhaps the king of the orchids, as Susan Orlean suggested in her 1998 book, The Orchid Thief. His Homestead nursery has annual revenues of $1.5 million, and has won more than 800 awards... from the American Orchid Society. Last month he presided over the 19th World Orchid Conference... in Miami, and walked away with... prizes, including the grand champion display exhibit award he had long coveted. He lives... on a 10-acre plot... He and Michael Coronado, his life and business partner... the couple spend most of their time outdoors in their... garden and in three acres of orchid greenhouses.... Fuchs... is known... for extreme focus and... attention to detail... that have won him both admirers and enemies in the orchid world. ... Fuchss garden, stone paths meander through a jungle of... several thousand orchids... Maintenance is low, as he lets the plants grow naturally. Some of the orchids are more than 60 years old, collected or grown by his grandfather. The elder Fuchs introduced his grandson, now 61, to orchid hunting in the swamps when he was barely in grade school. To make sure he didnt disappear into an alligator hole, his grandfather tied a rope around his waist, yanking when the rope stretched taut. By 19,... Fuchs had discovered his first natural hybrid [name ?], in Nicaragua, which is still in his collection. Orchids live forever as long as you take care of them, he said. You have to have light and air movement. My main advice is dont over-water. More people kill orchids through over-watering than anything else.... Fuchs collects orchid memorabilia, and his display cases overflow with crystal orchid prizes and antiques like a 500-year-old Chinese teapot with an orchid traced in red; a gold-and-ruby Fabergé egg with a jeweled orchid at its center; and a 150-piece set of antique porcelain with a hand-painted orchid design. Even the ultramodern den is decorated with 19th-century orchid lithographs. Above the two-story coral-rock fireplace in the foyer is a painting of the hybrid Vanda Memorial[Memoria ?] Fred Fuchs by the botanical artist Angela Mirro. In the game room... a Tiffany-inspired stained-glass panel... Fuchs designed... depicting still more orchids. ... Fuchss family came to Florida four generations ago, his German-born great-grandfather buying 160 acres in 1912... His grandfather started a small nursery where... Fuchs raised and sold African violets as a 10-year-old. After retiring from the local post office, his father, a part-time gardener, devoted all his time to growing orchids and leading orchid hunts in Latin America. By the time Mr. Fuchs graduated from high school, he was so involved with orchids his parents gave him a greenhouse, but it was not until his 1984 success that he could afford to raise orchids full-time. ... he has been a controversial figure since he began winning international prizes... In The Orchid Thief, Ms. Orlean says he is brassy and opinionated and has at times gone out of his way to be argumentative. Martin Motes, another prize-winning vanda grower who lives a few miles away, calls him a good marketer and an incredible salesman, but adds that Mr. Fuchs is a very dominant personality who can be relentless and needs to have absolute control. Dr. Motess wife, Mary, wrote a darkly comic self-published novel in 2006 in which the villain, a controlling orchid society president, is clearly modeled on... Fuchs. ... Fuchs, who served two terms as trustee of the American Orchid Society and five as president of the South Florida Orchid Society, brushes off such criticism as the product of professional jealousies. He is not controlling, he said, Im organized and want to run it right, play by the rules and play with the team, but every team has a captain. At the recent World Orchid Conference,... 1,000 orchids in his elaborate diorama, called On the Road to Mandalay, a 1,000-square-foot exhibit... What edged... Fuchs ahead was the color flow he achieved in placing his plants, said Marianne Montoro, one of the judges. You could erect the Eiffel Tower, but its still all about the quality of the flowers. ... Fuchs was clearly satisfied... heading off shortly to head the judging at an El Salvador orchid show and then leading a tour of gardens and museums in Fuji, Australia and New Zealand. Anybody can get to the top, he said, but staying there requires considerable effort. " URL : http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/07/garden/07orchid.html?ref=style *************** Regards, VB _______________________________________________ the OrchidGuide Digest (OGD) [email protected] http://orchidguide.com/mailman/listinfo/orchids_orchidguide.com
