Steppe brother: Vojtech Holubec coming to America!

There are few people I admire and envy more than this man: his day to day work is dedicated to the preservation and study of germ-plasm (seed!) of plants as head of the Czech seed bank. And for more decades than he would care to admit he has traveled the world in study of plants.

As a youngster, he was one of those who developed the Czech school of crevice gardening. He documented his knowledge in a book in 1992 called "the Rock Garden and its plants"--which alas, has not been published in English yet--but there's time. He has beautifully displayed his technique in his extraordinary private garden which I featured on Prairie Break last year.


We first met in the 1980's when he was a visiting scholar at a University in Texas: he drove up to Colorado several times to botanize and visit--even then he had a vast resume of exploration throughout Eurasia.

He has offered an incomparable list of fantastic plants on his personal Index Seminum over the decades--many of which are new to horticulture. I remember obtaining Hemerocallis graminea from a collection of his 35 years ago from Mongolia

This is one of the most remarkable members of its genus, and his is the only introduction I'm aware of. and the list could go on for pages!

 He produced a monumental coffee table tome on the flowers of the Caucasus (the only such book thus far available on this scale for that important mountain range) and will be launching a brand new volume on the flowers of the Tian Shan on his lecture tour this fall.


 You can read lots more about Vojtech and his upcoming tour on the writeup on the North American Rock Garden Society's website: click here to go to that page.







 But why not catch one of his presentations around the United States this fall?

September	9/15/18	Rocky Mountain Chapter - September 15th
		Denver to Raleigh Durham NC
	9/29/18	Piedmont Chapter - September 29th
	?	Four Seasons GC
	?	Potomac Valley Chapter
October	10/6/18	Delaware Valley- October 6th
	10/13/18	Tri-State Chapters - October 13th
	10/14/18	BNARGS - October 14th

He will be one of the four stellar presenters at this year's Steppe Summit at Denver Botanic Gardens along with Chris Gardner (Silk Road Flora), Zdenek Zvolanek (Crevice Gardening) and Mike Bone, Curator of Steppe Collections at Denver Botanic Gardens.

Denver's a great destination in September (and you get the aspens turning in the mountains as a bonus, not to mention Denver Botanic Gardens)...

See you there!