Shas­tri Boodan

The T&T Or­chid So­ci­ety (TTOS) is com­mit­ted to play­ing an ac­tive role in the preser­va­tion of the en­vi­ron­ment in or­der to pro­tect or­chid species, their habi­tat and their hosts. Pres­i­dent of the TTOS, Gopaul Chack­an, says a lot of lo­cal va­ri­eties have been stripped from the wild over the years and some species have com­plete­ly dis­ap­peared. He al­lowed the T&T Guardian to pho­to­graph the Gongo­ra Mac­u­la­ta lactea, a rare specie that has com­plete­ly dis­ap­peared from the wild. He said the Gongo­ra along with the Ce­dros Bee (oncindi­um lanceanum) and the But­ter­fly Or­chid (oncindi­um pa­pil­lo) have lost their nat­ur­al habi­tat be­cause of log­ging and re­lat­ed de­for­esta­tion ac­tiv­i­ties. "Our con­cerns with the prevalance, or lack there­of, of the ap­prox­i­mate­ly 125 or­chid species oc­cur­ring lo­cal­ly in­clude or­chid habi­tats loss and poach­ing ac­tiv­i­ties; seek­ing meth­ods for preser­va­tion even if it means look­ing at oth­er en­vi­ron­ments; con­duct­ing sur­veys through­out the coun­try to as­sess habi­tats; or­chid counts and risk as­sess­ments for sur­vival and nat­ur­al prop­a­ga­tion. "Ex­am­in­ing the need for ar­ti­fi­cial prop­a­ga­tion of species for re­pop­u­lat­ing nat­ur­al en­vi­ron­ments; mak­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tion to the gov­ern­ment and its agen­cies with re­spect to leg­is­la­tion; con­ser­va­tion and de­c­la­ra­tion of spe­cial ar­eas for the pro­tec­tion of sen­si­tive and en­dan­gered species."

Trib­ute

The TTOS will stage its first show for the year on Sat­ur­day at the San Fer­nan­do Tech­ni­cal In­sti­tute, at which it will pay trib­ute to moth­ers. Chack­an said vis­i­tors to the event could ex­pect to see a wide ar­ray of flow­er­ing plants on dis­play. He said or­chid lovers would al­so have the op­por­tu­ni­ty to see a large ar­ray of all their favourite den­dro­bi­ums, cat­telyas, oncindi­ums and oth­er va­ri­eties. The stag­ing of an or­chid show in the south on an an­nu­al ba­sis is a re­cent fea­ture of the so­ci­ety, brought on by a de­mand from the pa­trons of south to bring the ex­hi­bi­tion clos­er to them. "The show at­tracts pa­trons through­out our twin is­lands. It is still in its growth phase. Our pre­miere event is the show staged in the north in the month of Oc­to­ber. Pe­ri­od­i­cal­ly, we in­vite judges of the Amer­i­can Or­chid So­ci­ety (AOS) to vis­it and judge at our show." He said last year the TTOS got 14 AOS awards. "Al­so for the north show we ob­tained par­tic­i­pa­tion from or­chid so­ci­eties in­vit­ed from oth­er Caribbean coun­tries." He said the TTOS was in its 56th year of ex­is­tence and was fo­cus­ing its at­ten­tion on build­ing in­sti­tu­tions with­in the so­ci­ety to un­der­take the var­i­ous func­tions. "There is al­ways some­thing new turn­ing up as chal­lenges to the so­ci­ety so we are far from the po­si­tion where the so­ci­ety's ac­tiv­i­ties can be po­si­tioned on a plateau." Chack­an said TTOS mem­bers were hy­bri­dis­ing and cul­ti­vat­ing or­chids lo­cal­ly, in keep­ing with its mis­sion: "To strive for ex­cel­lence in all as­pects of or­chid cul­ti­va­tion and to pro­vide a so­cial en­vi­ron­ment for the ex­change of per­ti­nent in­for­ma­tion and ideas among mem­bers of the so­ci­ety." Chack­an said the TTOS want­ed to en­cour­age lo­cal grow­ers to get in­to the fresh cut flower mar­ket. He said T&T im­port­ed mil­lions of dol­lars in fresh cut flow­ers an­nu­al­ly, adding that some of the de­mand could be met lo­cal­ly by in­di­vid­u­als sup­ply­ing florists in their com­mu­ni­ty.