Ready your roots, flower fans: the Denver Orchid Society’s twice-yearly plant sale is returning this weekend.
The show, which is being billed as “Orchids With Altitude,” will have about 600 plants for sale, sourced from 10 wholesalers across the nation.
Keith Funk, the event’s chair, said the blooms will be priced as low as $20 for entry-level specimens and as high as $100 for rarer species.
“These are all going to be orchid types that you can’t find locally,” he said.
The event will take place at Nick’s Garden Center in Aurora on Sept. 13-14.
‘Orchids With Altitude’ supports a community united by their orchid obsessions.
Funk has been growing orchids since he was a kid, when a family friend introduced him to the family of plants.
“That was it. That was like a switch went off in my head,” he remembered. “The plants are just bizarre. They don't look like anything else. And then they produce this flower that is just incredible.”
Today, Funk fosters a dense garden of orchids in his unfinished basement. His plant room is sealed off by large plastic sheets that help maintain the ideal humidity and temperature for the notoriously finicky specimens. Watching him pull back the curtain is like watching the reveal of a secret garden hiding beneath his Centennial home.
The show this weekend, he said, is part of a series of regular spring and fall fundraisers that help support the Orchid Society’s programming.
The group meets monthly at the Denver Botanic Gardens, where they celebrate their shared passion, swap orchid tips and even bring in guest speakers to talk about growing.
Beth Hurliman, an Orchid Society member who’s maintained a greenhouse behind her Lakewood home for 18 years, said the club has given her a community.
“You're around people that have the similar interests,” she said. “You get information from people that's useful. You trade plants back and forth. A lot of plants that I've got — I've given people divisions, they've given me divisions back and it's just sharing an interest.”
If you’re orchid-curious, this might be your opportunity to go all in on the hobby.
Funk said the society welcomes everyone, especially beginners. The show this weekend is a great entry point, he told us, since there will be experts everywhere to help newbies learn the ropes.
“It can be challenging,” he said. “And you will kill plants, I promise you. You will kill lots of plants.”
His advice for new growers: prioritize infrastructure early. His plant room is filled with tubes and water trays that can be fed from a single hose, which greatly simplifies his watering routine.
“Make it as easy on yourself as possible. Automate everything you possibly can,” Funk said.
Taylor Crawford, another dedicated orchid member, said new growers should consider what kinds of plants fit their lifestyles. He settled on miniature species for his collection, which fill a handful of climate-controlled terrariums in his Lakewood home. His setup is even more automated than Funk’s, using sensors to activate humidifiers and watering lines without much intervention.
“I'm a busy guy. It's a lot of maintenance to be able to grow orchids if you don't have the time to care for them. This takes care of a lot of the legwork,” he said. “I don't really have to do anything with that other than do some occasional weeding.”
New growers will find immense satisfaction once their systems get ironed out, Crawford said. It’s worthwhile work.
“You get what you put into it, just like you do anything else in life,” he said. “It's very, very rewarding.”
