Dear Friends, Tony Avent's " Plant Delights Nursery E-Newsletter April 2013" arrived in my email yesterday, but it was finally a nice spring day and I avoided most email. This morning I read the following paragraph that should be of interest to many who recall the better days of the International Bulb Society. " My final farewell today is to a group...the International Bulb Society. The 80-year-old International Bulb Society, which has long been an incredible resource to bulb lovers around the world, has decided to fold at the end of 2013. The society’s problems began over a decade earlier, when a series of ego-driven personality conflicts caused many of the members to drop out and join the recently-formed Pacific Bulb Society. Despite the fact that most new members didn’t live anywhere near the Pacific Ocean, the new group offered a more user-friendly format with far less drama while making sharing rare plants at low cost a key principle...the antithesis of IBS. I am truly sad to see IBS go as it brought together so many wonderful experts from around the world, and if you could afford the plant prices, it was a place to acquire the rarest of the rare bulbs. Who knows...if you believe in the afterlife, perhaps there will one day be a reincarnation of this wonderful group." It is a strange coincidence to have the news of Mary Sue's "retirement' so close to this demise. Spring is coming. Best Jim W.