Saturday, September 9th
Balboa Park Casa del Prado, room 104
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“Bromeliads of Ecuador”
This month's presentation by Cristy Brenner

 Ecuador is an excellent country to see Bromeliads because of its relatively small size and numerous different habitats.  We saw steamy coastal lowlands, foggy low elevation cloud forests, coastal dry forests, deserts, tropical rainforests, high altitude cloud forests and the páramo region.  Cristy has traveled to Ecuador on six trips (it’s that good!) with Plant Expeditions (Guillermo Rivera).  All of the trips were great, and she selected the 2017 trip because of the special people who attended:  Pam Koide-Hyatt and Jose Manzanares (author of the two volumes on Ecuadorian Bromeliads). All of the trips were wonderful, but having two world Bromeliad experts along with us made this an extra special trip.

Cristy is a retired community college geography professor from Mission Viejo, California. As a geographer, she has visited all of the continents, but in recent years she has concentrated on traveling to regions where bromeliads are located. She has photographed bromeliads in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, Brazil, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela. In Venezuela, she was part of a helicopter expedition to the top of Auyun Tepui and a second trip included a hike to the top of Roraima Tepui. She is a member of all Southern California Bromeliad societies, and is the former president of the Saddleback Valley Bromeliad Society and current newsletter editor.  She is also a former member of the BSI board and a BSI judge.