What I did on my Christmas Vacation

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE working on my ‘little’ plant magazine project, my issue isn’t content, or software, or lack of ideas, it’s time. Over the past two weeks, I was able to rewrite the entire autumn/winter issue of Plant Society Magazine, and I am so pleased to say that it is complete. This project has been an adventure, with readership growing every day (over 4000 downloads for iPads since September and nearly 1000 paper copies sold), it’s a tiny success, and I’ll take it since I had doubted that there are even a thousand curious plant-people who would find interest in an horticultural subject.

Who knows if this ‘little magazine project’, ‘digital diary’, ‘eZine’, or whatever I call it at the moment, will grow into something else as technology advances, but it’s been a fun venture for the moment. With so many photos and plants in my collections between the greenhouse and my travels, it doesn’t seem as if I will be running out of content for some time.

Check out this latest magazine, THE JAPAN ISSUE, my winter 2011 installment with articles on Lachenalia – how to grow them from bulbs, from seed, and where to buy them, a story on the amazing Snow Peonies of Japan, Ume Plums and the culture that surrounds them, and of course, the Japanese native orchids of Dendrobium moniliforme and Neofinetia displays.  This issue much improved, since a printed version is now almost a book, with 83 pages, and best of all – it is perfect bound (instead of just stapled). Order it now the on the award winning Hewlett Packard site called Magcloud.com. Yes, it does cost more ( $19.95, but my profit is still $1.00 per issue and the extra page count increases the price. Still, there is no advertising, so every page is content, ( and what plant magazine can say that?).