Bedfordvidew resident honours memory of cancer victim with orchid creation
“Naming the orchid after her ensures that her memory lives on," shared Vorster.
Eighty-year-old orchid hobbyist, George Vorster, has paid tribute to a young cancer victim by creating an orchid in her memory.
His creation has been registered at the Royal Horticultural Society in London.
The Bedfordview resident shared his passion for plants and reflected on his journey into orchid cultivation and the process of hybridisation.
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“I’ve always been interested in plants, animals and gardening.
“It wasn’t until I attended an orchid show in Emmarentia back in 1986 that I bought my first orchid.
“And here we are now nearly 40 years later, and I have about 600 orchids,” stated Vorster.
He said orchids always present a new challenge with the variety of about 50 000 species.
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Hybridising is when you take pollen from one flower and put it on the stem of another flower – mixing two different species.
When his daughter’s godchild died at the age of 13 due to bone cancer he saw it fit to honour her memory.
“I had already created the orchid, and when it finally bloomed, I decided to name it after her.
“She was very dear to my daughter and us, even though our relationship was somewhat distant.
“Naming the orchid after her ensures that her memory lives on,” he shared.
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Vorster is also an active member of the East Rand Orchid Society, which he co-founded about 15 years ago.
The society, catering to orchid enthusiasts residing in the East Rand, hosts orchid markets twice a year, with the first one recently held on Mother’s Day.
