As the webmaster, I get to make all of the introductions, so let me present you to Weyman Bussey! The first photo, on the left, was taken in February of 2003, in Boynton Beach, Florida. Jean Merkel, to the left has been a close friend since the early seventies. *Jean passed away on March 31st 2005, the orchid world, and especially Weyman, miss him. The picture to the right was taken outside Weyman's lab in Cordoba, Veracruz in 2002.
This is his speaker’s page and since he gives an average of ten talks a year around the U.S., most of you probably know him, or at least, have heard of him. If you don’t, you just have to invite him to give a talk to your society. I have never seen him give a “formal” presentation, but if it is half as fun as listening to him during regular conversation, you will be in for a real treat! They say he is never more than an hour late for the meetings, so you’ll have to figure out a way to make him think they start an hour earlier (maybe two to be safe!). I guess it’s hard to live in Mexico for 23 years and not adopt at least a few of the customs.
Weyman eats, sleeps, and breathes ORCHIDS! Starting at the age of 12 and continuing to date, orchids have been his hobby, profession and passion. From the time he graduated from college in 1976, he has been located in the American tropics, where he claims he can at least be close to the orchids in the wild, and he doesn’t have to worry about them freezing. He earned his B.S. degree in Ornamental Horticulture and Botany at the University of Florida. He frequently mentions famous orchid people he has evidently learned a lot from, such as Milton Carpenter, Tom Sheehan, Jean Merkel, Joe Rudvalis, Ben Berliner, Fred Thornton, to name a few. He has traveled extensively around the world and from what I have heard, gives a very good presentation, not overly technical, but down to earth and loaded with common sense (of course you know, common sense is the least common of the senses!).
All presentations require audience participation, include a brief psychotherapeutic introduction, powerpoint projections, made exclusively for your society, posted exclusively for your society on this website, downloadable, with at least 250 pictures, printed handouts (so you will remember it), and door prizes (plants to practice what you learn about, or Vanilla beans) rewarded to the audience for their participation during the talks. All presentations require a laptop and computer projector. This way over 200 pictures are presented with great graphics and several slides per screen. Remember, your society can also download the presentation from this website for preservation.
These presentations are also available in Spanish for interested societies in Latin America. (Estos presentaciones tambien estan presentadas por Weyman en Español!)
1. "Mexican Species, Distinguishing the Common from the Uncommon" - This talk is now available on Powerpoint. The handout summarizes everything with charts and tables, so you don't have to take notes. It compares 35+ species in 7 distinct, often confused groupings -Laelias, Myrmecophilas, small flowered yellow Oncidiums, Oncidium maculatum group, Oncidium laevae group, and the cool and warm growing mule ears (now called Trichocentrums). These are surprisingly the most popular and more often confused Mexican species. At the end, if the crowd is still interested and time permits, there are over a dozen more spectacular species which are easily distinguished, 50+ species all total are presented.
2. "Fifty Showy Mexican Species, Where they come from and how they grow" - This is Weyman’s oldest presentation, having written it up and presented in Australia in 1985. It includes a handout with a neat summarized reference chart of over 100 species (also found on this website), plus 140 slides of 50+ species, including a lot of their habitats. This talk is tailored to the growing conditions of the area where the talk is given, so the species will vary depending on the local growing conditions or preferences indicated by the society. It is a variable talk which can be modified into different lectures using different species for societies which are close together and sharing speakers, or societies who would be interested in hearing more than one presentation. Weyman has a working knowledge of over 250 Mexican species. He can also go into more cultural details or emphasize the habitat as per the society’s preference. This talk covers a very diverse selection of SPECTACULAR species.
3. "Conservation or Conversation, Consumption is not being done about it! Every time we go traveling together into the back woods, Weyman never tires of complaining about the waste the governments have created by their legislation “TRYING” to control the commercialization of wild plants, especially the orchids! I quote “Who are we kidding? The governments of the world are legislating orchid species out of existence! How the hell can you protect something that requires another species to survive upon it, without protecting the other species also? Then to cap it off, they’re trying to stop the damage after its already been done, in the transportation and sales, the end of the line for the plants! To make things even worse, they put the largest plant family on earth under control, simply because they are incapable of distinguishing the species at the international borders. They confiscate plants and destroy them because of lack of documentation? Prohibiting instead of promoting, classic illogical control issues!” and believe me he says a whole lot more, but this site is not big enough to mention it all here.
Weyman claims he has spent many years and a lot of money on this one. He barely survived his first major effort to blow the lid off the international conspiracy to condemn the orchid family to die where the tree falls. If any of the groups want to get their pulse up without jogging, then I highly recommend this talk. No written handouts or tape recorders allowed, to protect the guilty and Weyman. All he did was challenge CITES with a legitimate rescue effort, see the January 1989 AOS Bulletin, "Salvaging Orchids in Mexico". He even made a company in the eighties called “Save the Flora International”, in the US and Mexico. Now he’s spent the last 14 years saving himself. LOTS OF PICS! Become informed!
4. "Tropical Polymin Cymbidiums” or “ Why do my Cymbidiums I buy in the grocery store always die, or never bloom again?”
What COULD supersede the Phalaenopsis as a popular indoor orchid plant in this millennium?
This is another story Weyman likes to burn my ears with on our long road trips around Mexico. He says he grew up with a special man, Milton Carpenter, who got him hooked on orchids and then destiny sent him to his first job out of college in Colombia, South America. He then departed to Mexico in 1980, via California. The common denominator of the three situations? Cymbidiums. Of course, he has only brought a few here to Aquismon, because we are near sea level and our daily average temperature six months out of the year is ninety-five degrees! He claims his new clones are good, but you have to draw the line somewhere, it would be like raising parrots out of doors in Alaska!
Twenty years in development and they are still on the threshold of mass release. They're so new, few people have heard about them! This is the true story, with slides, of a new line of orchids for commercial cut flowers and potted flowering plants. How they got here, defying Darwin’s theory of evolution, what they look like and where they are today. Finally, there is a Cymbidium that fits in your greenhouse and also grows and blooms there. If a group chooses this talk he will bring meristems. A handout also goes with this talk.
5. "Modern Breeding Trends using Mexican Orchid Species" –
This is an area of expertise that only comes with trial and error, plus lots of practice. I have grown and bloomed a number of his crosses here in Aquismon and it amazes me how much longer lasting and showier hybrid plants are than species. When I ask him about the crosses, he gives me a reason WHY, for all of them!
This presentation is a summary of information that Weyman has gathered over the last 25 years, concerning New World crosses with the potential to become popular and commercial. He says, “if Taiwan and Thailand can do it with Dendrobiums, Phalaenopsis and Vandas, then why can't we do it with our own Encyclias, Laelias, Odonts, Oncidiums and others? The First and Third Worlds have to work together in our own hemisphere in order to make orchids both popular, available, and above all, affordable.” This talk is about what others have done and what he has done and is doing in his own program in Mexico. 100+ slides and Summary Handout.
6."Orchid Culture in the Tropics, Ecologically Sustainable Methods" –
I talked him into offering this one! To teach me how to grow orchids, Weyman got me to memorize a very simple acronym: W.A.N.T.S. = Water, Air, Nutrition, Temperature and Sunlight. They are the Five Elements, they fit on your hand, and they are the basic truth and essentials to growing anything! He quickly showed me how to apply the Ying Yang to tropical orchid growing. He claims it’s the same all over the world, somebody just has to show you how the five basic growth factors are inter-related and how you can diagnose your growth problems by knowing these relationships.
This is his basic “growers” talk for people within all stages of experience, which to date he claims to have only given in Spanish, but agrees with me, everybody could really benefit from it. When I saw an old handout he used at an orchid symposium in Jalapa, Veracruz in 1993, I found it very interesting. Oh yes, his acronym came to him first in Spanish! F.A.T.A.L. = Fertilizantes, Agua, Temperatura, Aire and Luz, you can guess what they mean! This presentation also includes an overview of the more common materials that have been used over the years, how they evolved, how they work and ends up focusing on volcanic rock, coffee logs and inert media. The idea is to get people out of organics, which require the death of something so your orchids can live, and eventually will kill your plants. Handouts are available in English or Spanish. Practical demos included with slides.
7. "Vanilla, the Edible Orchid" – Commercial Vanilla flavoring was first used by the ancient Mexican natives, thousands of years ago. After living a year a and a half in the commercial Vanilla production region of Mexico and consulting for an international spice trading firm on the subject during that time, Weyman decided to offer this talk for those who have a "taste" for orchids. He learned a lot about Vanilla and love’s to share it. There are 100 slides showing the region, its people, the plantations and the processes involved in the Mexican Vanilla industry. He will bring to this talk some original authentic commercial Mexican Vanilla vines and beans for sale plus some of the vanilla bean artwork, which is fragrant to hang around the kitchen and even use for cooking. There is a handout and the door prizes for participation are guess what?
NOTE
For any questions you can email Weyman directly to goldenbear@rocketmail.com and if you send him your phone number, I am sure he will call you right back! He is living again in Mexico and consults for an orchid company in California. Since it is a consulting job, he has a pretty open schedule. His calendar is open for 2008, except for January (WOC month). Two weeks before Valentines, Two weeks before Easter and Two weeks before Mothers Day. He is avaiable on and after the actual holiday date. He does have some Cymbidiums for sale and can obtain almost any species ordered in advance for delivery at the talk.
