Where it all began

It began around 37 years ago while browsing around a garden centre with a keen interest in growing Bonsai, there were none in stock but I did happen upon some strange plastic vials containing carnivorous plants in tissue culture so I eagerly bought some to entertain myself with, I knew very little about carnivorous plants back then but that was enough to spark my interest and search out other carnivorous plants in garden centres far and wide and this continued for many years and the obsession grew.

Back then I was not on the internet so information to hand was very limited, there were mistakes, there were wildly naive experiments, some worked with some being very inventive ways of killing new plants quickly but what really set me on the path to enlightenment was discovering a book called Carnivorous Plants (A Wisley Handbook) by Paul Temple, here I discovered The Carnivorous Plant Society and what was then Marston Exotics, founded by Adrian Slack and at the time operated by Paul and Jackie Gardner (now trading as P&J Plants) who I have been good friends with ever since, it wasn’t long before I persuaded my father to drive me up to Hereford and I was in awe of the plants there and bought all I could afford, some time later I went to an open day for the first time and I spent a small fortune returning home with a lovely selection of these amazing plants.

Before long I was hosting my own annual open days with limited spare plants available, swapping and buying many wonderful things, from there every year has been improved upon, great friends have been made and I even served over ten years with The Carnivorous Plant Society as promotions officer. Some of you reading today will be new to these amazing plants, luckily these days there is a vast pool of knowledge at your fingertips, you will make mistakes, you will learn and most certainly with success you will surely become obsessed with these fascinating plants as much as I and many others are, to not get obsessed with these wonders of nature is to say the least uncommon.