november 2007 desert breeze newsletter, tucson cactus & succulent society

8/8/2019 November 2007 Desert Breeze Newsletter, Tucson Cactus & Succulent Society

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November 2007

Thursday, November 1, 2007

TCSS BOARD

OfficersPresident: Richard Wiedhopf

885-6367Vice President: Vonn Watkins

Secretary: Nancy ReidTreasurer: Joe Frannea

Board of Directors:Norm Dennis (2007)

Barry McCormick (2007)

Jack Ramsey (2007)Marty Harow (2007)Peter Hubbell (2008)Joie Giunta (2008)

Keimpe Bronkhorst (2008)Bill Salisbury (2008)

Dan Birt (2009)Chris Monrad (2009)Mark Sitter (2009)

CSSA Affiliate Rep: Helen Barber

Cactus Rescue: Chris MonradConservation: Peter Hubbell

Educational: Joe FranneaFree Plants: Norma Beckman

Librarian: Joie GiuntaPrograms: Vonn Watkins

Refreshments: Patsy FranneaSales: Jack Ramsey

Technology: Kevin BarberResearch Grants:Gerald Pine

Volunteers: Nancy [email protected]

Editor: Karen [email protected]

Deadline for copy: 18th of each month

TCSS Web Page:www.tucsoncactus.orgWebmaster: Keimpe Bronkhorst

November RefreshmentsThose with family names beginning with

T to Z, please bring your choice ofrefreshment to the meeting.

Everyone is Welcome!Bring your friends, join in the fun,and meet the cactus and succulent

community.

7:00 P.M.Kelly Griffin

"A Visit to Madagascar."

Be prepared for an exciting journey toMadagascar with Kelly Griffin, curator ofxerophytic plants at Rancho SoledadNurseries. Kelly spent a month traveling thecountryside looking at the flora and fauna.He found plenty of both ....Lemurs, Aloes,Chameleons, Kalanchoes, Snakes,Alluaudias, Palms and Pachypodiums.Madagascar is a beautiful and very friendly,albeit extremely poor, country.

Kelly is the curator of xerophytic plantsat Rancho Soledad Nurseries in RanchoSanta Fe, California, one of the largestnurseries in Southern Californiaspecializing in rare and unusual palms,

cycads and

succulents fromaround the world.

Please attend thisamazing program on one of the most magical,yet endangered, environments on earth.

Sunday December 9, 200712 Noon to 3 pm

Annual Holiday PartyNo General Meeting in December

CaminoEscuela

River Road

Campell

St. PhillipsPlaza

Parking Junior League of TucsonKiva Bldg.

2099 E. River Road299-5753

Meeting Place

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I remember a meetingat the TucsonBotanical Gardens

about seven or soyears ago when thecall went out for a neweditor for ournewsletter The DesertBreeze. A hand wentup and a note was

made of the name and the rest is history. BarryMcCormick has produced more than seventynewsletters in his tenure as editor. Over thisperiod of time he has innovated the production,

introduced year-end color specials, created a fullcolor on-line edition and made you aware of allthe happenings of TCSS. He has encouragedeveryone to contribute articles, pictures and otherinformation and he has put them together for thebenefit of all.

This is his last newsletter. There are no words toexpress the commitment he has fulfilled to thissociety and how grateful we all are for a jobextremely well done except: THANK YOUBARRY.

You should know that the newsletter is just the tipof the iceberg. Our Expo, which completed itsthird biannual celebration, was initiated by Barry.He recruited his partner Blair Kuropatkin to dopublicity and even drive a truck to pick up showplants. Together they have made this plant showand sale and extraordinary success. Barry has

made sure that every plant in our shows iscorrectly labeled with the current name andspelling utilizing his computer skills and a largedatabase he helped develop. This is an underappreciated task but so important to the educationof the public who view our shows.

Blair has also been able to get television and printcoverage of our rescue and neighborhood andsales activities. Many of our members learnedabout the TCSS through her ability to get thispublicity for us.

For a number of years Barry's old trailer wasvisible at our rescue sites helping to transport andstore plants for future sales. He also took a lot of

photos of the early rescues for the newsletter

Barry has served on the Board of Directors for thelast six years and helped guide this organizationthrough this very large growth spurt. He hasdecided not to run for re-election. This doesntmean that he will not be involved but his monthlycommitments will be lessened.

Every organization needs dedicated volunteers andBarry has been one and encouraged so manyothers to do the same.

Personally and on behalf of all the members ofTCSS thank you again for all you have contributedto this Society.

Dick Wiedhopf, President

Housing Development Down CactusRescues Down

Our Cactus Rescue Program hasbeen very slow for the pastseveral months with only a fewrescues. This is largely due tothe housing market slowing somuch with many newdevelopment projects being puton hold. We are trying to reach

out a little more to areas and projects that we haveprobably missed. It takes a very proactiveapproach to be sure developers, landscapearchitects, governments, and others who have ahand in new developments are aware of our all

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volunteer program and to continually follow-upwith them. There is no cost to the developer toparticipate, just a little time to get us in theirdevelopment loop.

We welcome Noe Mayotte, one of our regularrescue crew members, to our efforts to follow upon leads and be proactive with developers andgovernments to snag a few more rescueopportunities. Always remembering, that we donot want to remove cactus from any site unlessthey are destined for the landfill or the mulcher.We do not remove plants from individualresidences but encourage unwanted cacti to berelocated. Dont forget that cholla are a primarynesting habitat for native birds.

Our last rescue was in the Vail area to removecacti from a 60 foot wide by 1200 feet long areathat will be cleared to add an additional natural gas

pipeline. This area was rich with Ocotillo from 6inches tall to 12 feet. There were hundreds ofYucca arizonica and several nice Sotol, Desertspoon, many too large for us to hand dig or haul.The medium size ones were fairly easy to dig andhandle if properly prepared, see photo. Thistechnique avoids many cuts to the legs and armsand allows easy access to dig up the shallow rootsonce the bottom leaves are trimmed.

We are gathering a few rescue cacti for theHacienda del Sol Sale on Sunday, November 11,and hope to have a rescue the day before to be ableto bring fresh plants directly to the sale. See ourweb site for last minute details regarding plants weplan to have at the sale. Details about our CactusRescues go out via email every Thursday.

Joe Frannea

Sycamore Canyon Field Trip

Good choice! Cory is delightfulbeyond words and was awonderful guide into SycamoreCanyon. He took plenty of time todiscuss plants, animals, and theCanyon itself. We saw a white

belted kingfisher, red tailed hawk, lots of beautifulbutterflies, hundreds of Arizona Chub in fabulouspools as well as many interesting water bugs,dragon flies, cute little rock toads, a youngtarantula, and *"!boing!!! a black tailed rattlesnake... in fact I nearly stepped on it!

We left our meeting point around 7:10 am. Wewaited for two missing members, but left withoutthem. With Cory, there were 11 of us. We gotback to our vehicles after 3 pm.

I recommend Cory for future hikes. He is easygoing and good with everyone, knowledgeable ofthe territory and LOVES being in our Sonorandesert! He provided a plant list of the Canyon toall.

Nancy Reid

Library Update

Rhipsalis & Lepismium byFrank Supplie. This smallbook has a lot of informationcovering the culture,propagation, pests, diseases and

more. The pictures will make identification easy.

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Melocacti of Cuba givescomprehensivedescriptions of the speciesfound in Cuba. There isinformation on thegeography, climate andphytogeography as wellas pictures, not only of

melocactus, but the countryside and other cacti.

Any books taken out this month will not be dueback until January.

Joie Giunta

Sycamore Canyon Field Trip

Good choice! Cory is delightful beyond words andwas a wonderful guide into Sycamore Canyon. Hetook plenty of time to discuss plants, animals, andthe Canyon itself. We saw a white belted

kingfisher, red tailed hawk, lotsof beautiful butterflies, hundredsof Arizona Chub in fabulouspools as well as many interestingwater bugs, dragon flies, cutelittle rock toads, a youngtarantula, and *"!boing!!! a black

tailed rattle snake... in fact I nearly stepped on it!

We left our meeting point around 7:10 am. Wewaited for two missing members, but left withoutthem. With Cory, there were 11 of us. We gotback to our vehicles after 3 pm.

I recommend Cory for future hikes. He is easygoing and good with everyone, knowledgeable ofthe territory and LOVES being in our Sonorandesert! He provided a plant list of the Canyon toall.

Nancy Reid

Pima County Country Fair Sale

The Pima County Country FairSale on October 21 wasunique because we did nothave our usual supply ofrescue plants. But we madedo with some alternatives andwe all had a good time.

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Thank you

The President's message is very kind. I haveenjoyed editing the newsletter very much, but feelit is healthy for an organization to have thingschange. And six years is a long time.

One reason the newsletter has been so enjoyable isthe support I have had from the members whocontribute the material. My mantra has beensimple: editors edit. While I have occasion takenpen in hand to add a small detail or flesh out asketchy report, the material in the newsletter hasbeen contributed by many people. In fact, one ofmy editorial goals is to have as many peoplecontribute as possible.

The four cornerstones of each issue are theMonthly program description, ably assembled byVonn Watkins; the President's column by Dick

Wiedhopf; the Cactus Rescue reports by JoeFrannea, and the library column by Joie Giunta.Building on these articles are the event and salesreports from Jack Ramsey and Nancy Reid. Overthe years many others have contributed; all thissupport makes it very easy. I have edited quite a

few newsletters; never have I had such an easy jobgetting contributions.

Current technology has made the job easier aswell. Much of the material comes to me in a formthat can just be pasted together; almost everythingcomes by email. I email the final file to Kinko's;and the first time I see a printed newsletter is whenit reaches my mailbox.

How is this magic performed? Through the skilland perseverance of our president, Dick Wiedhopf.Dick picks up the printed issue at the printer, dealswith delays and assembly problems, prints andapplies the mailing labels, stamps the 700 or socopies, and hand carries them to the downtownpost office from which they reach our mailbox,sometimes within hours. That's where the realwork is.

One final, very important thank you to my

successor, Karen Keller. Karen has actually doneseveral issues this year, when my travelsabsolutely conflicted with publication dates. Bestwishes to Karen, who will bring a fresh newperspective to the Desert Breeze.

Barry McCormickTCSS Financial Report

First Three Quarters of 2007

This is the financial report for the first nine months of 2007. The $10,000 set-aside for Rescue CrewOperations is necessary to ensure working monies for large tag purchases and other rescue expenses.Education and Research Funds are designated monies specifically earmarked for these programs.Rescue Cactus Program Expenses include $1,633 donated to the Educational Outreach Fund.

Major Categories: Income Expenses NetDues, Newsletters,Meetings, misc.: $13,486 $17,486 $(4,000)

Rescue Cactus Prog: $30,209 $20,488 $ 9,721Expo, Silent Auction,

Trips, Commissions: $29,494 $21,132 $ 8,362Donations, Grants: $ 2,995 $ 2,150 $ 845

Totals $76,184 $61,256 $14,928

Assets by Funds:General Fund: $25,609Rescue Operations: $10,000Educational Outreach: $ 9,790Research Fund: $ 7,636Total Assets: $53,035

For comments or questions contact Joe Frannea, Treasurer, email: [email protected]

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TCSS Rescue Cacti for SaleLots & lots to choose from..

Barrels - from 2 to 14 diameter (about $1 per inch)Hedgehogs from 1 to 20 heads (about $1 per head)

TCSS Club Members receive a 10% discount

Photos by John Durham and Barry McCormick. Logo Artwork by Vonn Watkins

Upcoming Schedule

November 2, Thursday -- General Meeting: Kelly Griffin.November 4, Sunday Wallace Gardens TourNovember 13, Tuesday 7:00 pm Board MeetingNovember 11, Sunday Hacienda del Sol Plant Sale

December 9, Sunday Annual Holiday PartyJanuary 3, Thursday General MeetingJanuary 8, Tuesday 7:00 pm Board Meeting

november 2007 desert breeze newsletter, tucson cactus & succulent society

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