Loran Whitelock's Garden

[mcrawford]

Loran Whitelock's 86th birthday would've been this past Thursday.

For those of you who have been to his famous garden (and those

who have not), here is on last chance to walk through...

http://www.pbs.org/video/1372139957/

[Mike Evans]

It is great that WEDU covered Loran's world class garden, but too bad they had a novice do a piss poor job describing it.  

[mcrawford]

And the video quality is poor, but that's all that is left.

It has mostly moved to the Huntington BG, but I have

yet to see it.  I hope they honored his request/bequest.

Here is another neat link a friend of Loran's, Geoff Stein

did:  http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/5151/

[Pip]

4 hours ago, Mike Evans said:

It is great that WEDU covered Loran's world class garden, but too bad they had a novice do a piss poor job describing it.  

Novice? Have you been awarded a gold medal for a garden design by the Queen at her Chelsea Flower Show?

I'd agree that the segment could have been better, but with the constraints of a tiny segment and such an extensive collection there are far too many stories to tell. 

[Kevin S]

 I just feel I was fortunate enough to get to go to His garden and see it in all it's splendor.  When I first got into cycads  I found his number online and gave him a call.  I got to go visit him for my birthday and pick out my birthday presents from my mom there.  He was very nice and his garden was spectacular.  He signed my copy of his book I had at that time.  I got the walk around in the garden taking photos with a three megapixel camera at the time which was top-of-the-line  Digital camera with floppy disc LOL. 

  I fell in love with aloe plants that visit.  His tree aloes were in flower at the time and there were so many hummingbirds visiting them.  He joked around about how he carried the tree aloe on his back to where he planted it.  Few years later he was a  Guest speaker at a garden club somewhere in LA area I went and I watched his lecture.  After that ran into him once or twice at plant sales or garden clubs. 

 I just hope the Huntington garden does a good job with his collection.

[mcrawford]

Although best known for his work with cycads, Loran also had a keen interest in palms,

particularly Chamaedorea.  (Don Hodel named a Oaxacan species in his honor)

He had a fabulous Chamaedorea garden mid way down-slope and just off his guest

room.  I wish I could find photos!  Plenty of orchids too.