Luring in younger bulb growers
Nicholas plummer (Fri, 18 Oct 2013 10:30:46 PDT)

When I joined the local orchid society at age 21, I was by far the
youngest member. Now that I am comfortably middle aged, I look around and
see lots of people my own age. There are still very few 20-year olds, but
the orchid society hasn't withered away in the past 20 years. Apparently,
a bunch of my peers who didn't care about plants when we were young are now
enthusiastic orchid growers (or bulb growers, or succulent growers). This
makes sense to me. The percentage of 20-somethings who build light gardens
in their student apartments is probably small compared to the number of
middle aged people who own houses with gardens. My conclusion is that
horticultural societies probably shouldn't worry too much about attracting
young people in particular. As long as membership is stable or slowly
growing, the age of members isn't so important.

(That's not to say that enthusiastic young people shouldn't be encouraged.
Of course they should.)

Nick Plummer
Durham, NC