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![//Lachenalia aloides// var. //aurea// [If you can't see the picture, perhaps your browser settings need changing.]](/_detail/pict5136-680x1100.png?id=start "//Lachenalia aloides// var. //aurea// [If you can't see the picture, perhaps your browser settings need changing.]")
SABG
Noticeboard
- Newsletter no. 45 (September 2021) is now available. [16 September 2021]
- The SABG meeting planned for Sunday 3 October: Autumn 2021 meeting (Winchester) has regretfully been cancelled. [7 September 2021]
- The 2021 Bulb & Seed Exchange has now closed. Members who submitted requests by email should have received a confirmation reply from Jon Evans, who posted requested bulbs and seeds to members on 6 September. [7 September 2021]
News
- I’ve added Paul Lewis’s web-site to our page of Links to other web sites: don’t forget to click on “BLOG” at the top of his home page (https://www.paullewis-plantbreeder.co.uk/) to see his results breeding Crocosmia and Gladiolus. It’s not a selling page, but you can contact him through the form on his “ABOUT” page to ask how to acquire his plants. [18 October 2021]
- I’ve added a page on How to grow South African bulbs. Please let me know of any further sources of similar information. [10 September 2021]
- Paul, our chairman, has some spare bulbs for sale, to UK members only. UK members should have received an email with the list and instructions. [6 August 2021]
- We are sorry to have to report the death of Terry Smale on 16 February 2021, at the age of 76. He was one of our founding members and always a friendly and enthusiastic source of plants, information and encouragement. He will be greatly missed, and not just by SABG members: he was an active member of the BCSS, Mesemb Study Group, AGS and RHS. He had a large collection of Conophytums – the BBC filmed his plants for a 6-minute section of the “Gardeners’ World” programme shown on Friday 28th August 2020, which can be seen on-line at https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08qn68n 1). On behalf of the SABG and its members, the Committee send their condolences to his wife Jennifer. [8 March 2021]
SABG Members: are you receiving our emails?
The following emails were sent recently to all SABG members whose email addresses we have. If you are a member and didn’t receive any of them, please email Richard White (see “Contacts” on this page).
- Newsletter no. 45 (two or three emails, 18th September 2021)
- SABG meeting on 3rd October 2021 cancelled (7 September)
- Jon’s list and request instructions for the Bulb and Seed Exchange (16 August)
- reminder of the timetable for the Bulb and Seed Exchange (10 August)
- (to UK members only) on bulbs for sale by Paul (6th August)
Remember that reasons for not receiving our emails include the following:
- You haven’t notified us of a change of email address (tell me now!)
- We’ve made a mistake (these things happen, but tell me anyway!)
- Your inbox is full or your total email quota has been exceeded (download and delete old emails!)
- Your email provider classifies some of our emails as “spam” (look in your “Spam” or “Junk” folder and mark our emails as “not spam”!)
Autumn 2021 meeting (Winchester)
The next meeting planned for Sunday 3rd October 2021 has been cancelled. We had re-booked Chris Burchall to do the talk that he was to have given in October 2019 before we had to cancel, “Rhodohypoxis - Growing, Showing and Natural Environs”. The remaining details on this page can now be read as referring to our next meeting in Spring (March or April) 2022. Directions to the meeting hall. The doors will open at 10.00, and the meeting will close at about 14.30.
More details of our meetings, including directions for getting there, are given on the meetings page.
Other meetings
- Saturday 16 October 2021: Nerine visit day
- Saturday in March 2022: Lachenalia visit day
- both organised by the Nerine and Amaryllid Society at the Five Arrows Gallery, Exbury Gardens, Exbury, Southampton SO45 1AX, subject to whatever restrictions are in place at the time, by kind invitation of Nicholas de Rothschild and Theo Herselman. These events are ONLY open for NAAS members; see the NAAS events page, and please inform Theo or the NAAS Secretary Alison Corley alison.corley@btinternet.com if you wish to attend.
Further information
- More information about our meetings, the location and directions are shown on our About our meetings.
- More information about the Group
- We have a Google Calendar, so you can add our events to your phone or other device.
- A list of our Past, present and future meetings
- Links to other web sites including suppliers of bulbs and seeds
- We have started a Digital library
Latest newsletters
- The latest newsletter is number 45 (September 2021). You can read or download all the SABG newsletters from our list of Newsletters.
Photo gallery
I plan to include a photo gallery here. Until it is ready, why not visit Audrey Cain's BulbWeb? Her web-site, now hosted by the SABG, contains over 1,400 photographs of plants in 175 genera (not all of them are South African).
About the Group
The SABG is based in the UK and is for anyone interested in growing the beautiful and diverse bulbous plants of South Africa and neighbouring countries. You do not need to be an expert (I’m not!) or live in the UK, but our meetings have all been in England so far.
The objective of the Southern African Bulb Group is to further the understanding of the cultivation of Southern African bulbs, where ‘bulbs’ is used in the broad sense to encompass bulb-, corm- and tuber- possessing Southern African plants, which are mostly ‘monocots’ (plants with strap-like leaves and flower parts in threes or sixes) but also including ‘dicots’ (with broad leaves and frequently five-petalled flowers) such as Oxalis.
Our activities include two meetings per year with talks and plant sales (recently these have been in Winchester in southern England), an annual bulb and seed exchange, and a newsletter with three or four issues per year.
Many of these plants come from the former Cape Province of South Africa, now the Northern, Western and Eastern Cape Provinces, and are easy to grow in a cool greenhouse or a sunny conservatory or window sill. They usually provide colourful flowers in autumn and winter and need a dry period in summer, because they are mostly winter growers from the winter rainfall areas of South Africa. Some are summer growers and a few of these will grow outside in southern or sheltered parts of the UK, such as Agapanthus, some Nerines and Tulbaghias, etc. Others, like Lachenalia, are real jewels to brighten up your conservatory when not much else is in flower.
For help with finding your way around, click on Help (on the sidebar, which may appear on the left of the page on computers and at the top on small devices).
Contacts
- To join the group, or to enquire about joining, email Rodney Sims rodney.sims@tiscali.co.uk. See How to join the SABG.
- To enquire about the newsletter or web site, to send suggestions for additions and improvements, or to submit items for inclusion, email Richard White richard@sabg.tk.
[Copyright © 2021 by the Southern African Bulb Group and Richard White.]
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