Several people have recently asked me “What is 365 days of orchids” and I realised that many may have missed day 1, January 1st 2017 when we set ourselves the challenge of posting an orchid every day of 2017 following the simple rule, that it had to be a different species every day that was flowering in our collection.

Well, with 1000 orchid species in the school collection we achieved our goal and realised that there was no good reason to stop after 365 days. Each day we take photos alongside watering the plants so that every morning has its orchid of the day.

Our orchid collection has been built up over 32 years from donations from orchid growers and nurseries (especially seedlings from Greenaway orchids and Kath Fairhurst) , purchases of species pertinent to our overseas projects and seed collections. The 1000 species represent 4% of all orchid species and we have a wonderful diversity of genera.

The collection acts a a focus for learning with volunteer students from year 7 to year 13 taking responsibility for all aspects of growing and propagating plants. The collection is also our source for seed and division that provides the plants we sell to fund our project and our work with tropical partners.

I hope that you continue to enjoy 365 days of orchids – what will tomorrow bring?