Diane, in California and most other states. many Caucasian women and girls take flower-arranging classes and enter flower arrangements in shows. They almost all buy their flowers at the Flower Mart or a florist shop. They seem to feel mass-produced exotic flowers impress the judges more than garden varieties they could grow themselves. I'm afraid they are right. But I'm prejudiced. I'm a Horticulture Judge. Shirley Meneice -----Original Message----- From: pbs-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:pbs-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Diane Whitehead Sent: Sunday, February 01, 2009 4:09 PM To: Pacific Bulb Society Subject: Re: [pbs] club members was Big Government I have wondered about the non-involvement of different cultural groups in our ornamental plant clubs. It is very strange to attend a plant convention in an area of Vancouver where 60% of the residents are Asian, and see only a couple of Asian attendees. However, joining clubs might be a strange thing to do. Why aren't we focussing on our families? Why aren't we spending all our spare time actually gardening instead of sitting around talking about it? I thought that maybe alpine plant growers might come from countries with mountains. Do we have a disproportionate number of descendants of Swiss and Austrians in NARGS? Do the bonsai clubs have Chinese and Japanese members? In Japan, many girls take flower-arranging classes, but they buy the flowers on the way in to class. I don't know about flower-arranging clubs here. The people growing vegetables in our allotment gardens are often fairly-recent immigrants. The San Francisco Botanical Garden at Strybing Arboretum has an outreach to various ethnic groups, asking them how they can help with their needs and interests. It was a while back that I attended a lecture on what they are doing, so I've forgotten a fair bit. I remember they have special events for Chinese New Year, including plant sales of lucky gold-flowered plants. Diane Whitehead > _______________________________________________ pbs mailing list pbs@lists.ibiblio.org http://www.pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/