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South Coast Cactus and Succulent Society Meeting – June 2015
2015-06-07 @ 1:30 pm - 4:00 pm PDT
IMPORTANT: The Society’s normal meeting date on June 14 has been preempted by the Fuchsia Society Show & Sale, so the Cactus & Succulent Society will meet a week earlier on June 7
Speaker
Laurel Woodley “Discovering Kalanchoes”
Laurel Woodley is a retired biology professor from Los Angeles Harbor 
College who has been involved in Southern California horticulture since the mid 1960’s. A fourth generation Californian who was introduced to plants in her youth by her parents who operated H.F. Woodley Nursery (specializing in fern propagation), Laurel attended UCLA majoring in Zoology with a minor in Botany. In subsequent years she was fortunate to have traveled to distant lands while taking Natural History classes led by Mildred Mathias. She has been interested in southern California flora with a special fondness for desert adapted plants. This led to her teaching classes for UCLA Extension in Dry Climate Gardening Using Cacti and Succulents, Horticultural Uses of Southern California Native Plants and co-leading Natural History classes to Death Valley, Anza Borrego State Park, Baja California; the Santa Monica and San Gabriel Mountains and ultimately Madagascar.
She has been volunteering at South Coast Botanic Garden (SCBG) since 2005 and is a member of a team who has been identifying and labeling the trees and shrubs in the garden. Presently, she is a Trustee of the SCBG and Past-President of the Cactus and Succulent Society of America.
Laurel’s talk will explore the many diverse species within the genus including their place of origin with an emphasis on the growth requirements and placement in the landscape.
Ed: Laurel has been a member of our club (SCCSS) for a while. Apart from her work with labels in the South Coast Botanic Garden and her long time input to the Desert Garden she is also an invaluable source of botanic knowledge to the gardens. She serves as a welcome advisor to the garden’s propagation department, not only helping to apply the correct names for plants for sale at the gift shop and sales but also supplying many cuttings and plants to be reared at the gardens. Laurel is also an accomplished photographer, most of you will have seen her great photos on our Facebook page and in SCBG newsletters.