Every month we have judging which is a separate event of our society. A number of American Orchid Society certified judges meet, and judge, screen out or award the various plants brought in. AOS awards are coveted by growers around the world and as a grower there is a bit of prestige to get a plant awarded.

All awarded and most marketable orchids sold by orchid nurseries and hobbyists plants have a name and if they were awarded they either show AM/AOS, HCC/AOS, FCC/AOS or other award abbreviations next to the plant. This is very important for orchid growers around the world, as without identification nobody knows what one is buying or what the plant will look like. A great amount of orchid hobbyists and professionals buy orchids without seeing it bloom out of catalogs and go by the name of the plant. We as hobbyists cannot identify the name of the plant just by looking at it, as there hundreds of thousands of registered names; however, we might be able to identify the genus the plant falls in.

Orchids are registered at the Royal Horticultural Society in England and when we make new crosses and we consider the cross pretty nice, we generally register our orchids. Orchid growing is a very interesting and vast hobby with a great amount of genera and species throughout the world and hobbyists from one end to the other. Orchids are even grown way up North in Alaska and Sweden and Norway, and they have orchid societies there, so it is a world wide hobby.

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