Orchids have arrived on Facebook! If you enjoy this social networking site, look for the new orchid-related sites that have been spearheaded by Alex Maximiano of OrchidWiz. There are several groups available including Orchid Species, which is designed to encourage people to learn about the orchid species of the world; Orchid Hybrids, which is dedicated solely to the over 140,000 orchid hybrids now available; and OrchidWiz, a site for comments on the software and how to use it.

Join the fun and find new people who are also interested in orchids. I have found some people from my hometown orchid society, some editors of newsletters here in the United States that I correspond with, and some international friends I have met at orchid functions and corresponded with. This is a great opportunity to meet people who are interested in orchids and to find those near you who can work with you on your hobby.

Go to the top right of the page and type “Orchids” in the search box. You should see a listing of all the different groups. Choose “Orchids” to get to the Orchid Quest page where you will find links to their other sites. Orchid Quest is a project started by Alex to create a Facebook orchid community promoting awareness of orchid issues, shows and events and the orchid hobby. Eventually there will be a separate webpage further explaining the project.

There are pages dedicated to different areas of the world and I am sure that more will be added as new users join. There is currently a group for Orchids in North America and Orchids in Europe. Orchid Photography is another very popular group as many hobbyists are also enthusiastic photographers as well. If you are one of these, check out this group as it is very active and has contests for the

One of the newer sites is the Save Our Orchid Garden which is dedicated to showing support for the American Orchid Society Orchid Garden which is in danger of being closed due to lack of funds. This would be a great loss to the orchid community since many of the orchids in their greenhouses were donated by famous growers and are difficult to replace. A group of South Florida residents are trying to raise money locally in order to keep the garden from being closed.

There is even a Send an Orchid application which you can use to send virtual orchids. The more orchids you send, the more options you have to send more. It’s fun!