George Fuller

One person that I was most anxious to meet at the New Plymouth Show was George Fuller. He is probably the person most responsible for the success of Disas in New Zealand. I had several chances to talk to him over the weekend and the following Monday and the history of the introduction of Disas into New Zealand is really interesting. He has been playing around with Disas for over 30 years!! The thing that really got to me was the fact that they were growing Disas in the 70's and since it wasn't publicized, no one knew about it except a small circle of friends. George has an interesting background. He worked in England at Kew and Sanders and decided to go back to New Zealand and was offered the chance to supervise the development of Pukekura Park in New Plymouth. The park is an absolutely amazing place. Has everything from a cricket field to a waterfall and practically everything else in between. The part that I liked the best was a series of greenhouses that are collectively known as the Fernery and are part of the Botanical Garden. To enter, you go thru a tunnel which opens into a grotto with native ferns all around. The different parts all emphasize different aspects of the New Zealand environment. There are many interesting botanicals and even a number of orchids. The picture shown above of George standing in the water was taken in one of the greenhouses of the Fernery complex, and if you look carefully over his shoulder, you can see some of the pink Veitchiis on display there. In the picture, George is actually hiding a big clump of Disas that are immediately behind him on the edge of the pool. One of the pots that he is holding is uniflora 'Satisfaction' which, when crossed with uniflora 'Torbay Pomegranate', produced a number of awarded unifloras. George came over to the April 2001 AOS Trustee's meeting in Ohio this spring to give a series of talks and was well received. He stopped by for a few days on the way home and I had a chance to spend several delightful days in his company.

The structure above is George's lath house where most of his Disas reside. Note that there is no screening and only protection from the rain by a fiberglass roof.
George and Ron Maunder inspect this year's flowering, looking for potential parents for this year's crosses. Below left, you can see at least one tag marking a cross. Below right is George at Yosemite's Nevada Falls in California.

When you don't have any screening on your shade structure, you sometimes get interlopers like this Monarch butterfly who seems a bit weighted down with pollen.
The photos above and below show two views of just one of the greenhouses in the Fernery at nearby Pukekura Park where George was Curator from 1966 until retiring in 1990. During his years as Curator, he shaped the policy of the park for the future. In the center of the photo below you can see a pool with the Disas on the bank behind it.

George explaining the results of a cross to Kathy.
Some of the plants held in reserve for the Park's displays. On the right are some of the giant pods on one of George's tripetaloides
A Disa Unimeyer	Disa uniflora 'Satisfaction'
Disa uniflora 'Trifid' Note the size!!	One of George's photos showing Disa uniflora 'Torbay Pomegranate'