Welkommen, Michael. I'm sure you are going to enjoy this group and all you learn from the members. Don't be shy about asking things as someone will probably have an answer and be delighted to give it to you. Shirley Meneice, Pebble Beach, CA 93953, USDA Zone 10 --- On Wed, 9/5/12, "J.Mäsgen" <neumannmaesgen@gmx.de> wrote: From: "J.Mäsgen" <neumannmaesgen@gmx.de> Subject: [pbs] My introducion To: pbs@lists.ibiblio.org Date: Wednesday, September 5, 2012, 12:22 PM Hi you all, I like to introduce myself. I am a new member since nearly a year. My proffession is horticulture. I work in the Botanical Gardens of Bonn. The tropical greenhouses including the Amorphophallus collection -especial A.titanum ( http://botgart.uni-bonn.de/o_samm/titan/… )- is together with an mediterranean bulb collection my job. Privatly my wife Jutta and I are gardening near Bonn on about 1500 m² garden by the house and another 1200 m² 10 minutes walk away. Both gardens are quite different. One has a small creek on two sides and is shady and wet. The other is a south facing slope, which is hot and dry. Both are zone 7. Beside the perinnial borders, a small alpine garden, some trees and shrubs, some vegetables and fruits, we have a bulb collection of about 800 different taxa. Main interesst is Narcissus, Crocus, Fritillaria, Colchicum, different Araceae, Hyacinthaceae from the Mediterranean area, and since we have a frostfree glasshouse Gladiolus from S- Africa as well as Oxalis, Colochortus, etc. At least everything with a bulb is wellcome! My wife runs a small wholesale buiseness for rare plants. This developed by often having so many spare bulbs and plants and not knowing what to do with it. This should bring in some money to support the collection. At leased we do travel as much as possible to see plants in the wild. In the last years we mostly went to mediterranean countrys. But more exotic contries like Georgia ( Caucasus), Mongolia, Kyrgistan were on the list as well as Kambodia, Borneo, and other tropic places. Still it is great fun working with plants. As much as my time will allow I will try to support the forum. Greetings Michael Neumann