Biography for Edgar Stehli

Bio:

     My interest in orchids began when I was just six or seven years old.  I found a plant growing in the roadside ditch near our house in North East Ohio.  When my father got home from work, I dragged him over to see my discovery.  He said “Oh! That’s an orchid.”  My first orchid find was a Spiranthes (probably cernua).  A few years later my family drove to Alaska and back.  On that trip, I found a Calypso bulbosa in Wyoming and several other orchids in Alaska and Canada.

    While in high school, I began growing some tropical orchids, and soon had a small collection.  While in my final year at Case Western Reserve University my orchid collection moved to Florida with my parents.   Sadly, I never saw them again (the orchids that is!).  Also in my last year, I met Kim Sante who was working at the Cleveland Garden Center, now known as the Cleveland Botanical Garden.  Eventually Kim and I were married in Kenya Africa.  Shortly after we were married we built a sun room on the corner of our house.  This of course allowed my orchid collection to get a little out of hand.  Finally in 1999 we began selling our plants to area florists, then through the orchid shows. We called our new business – Windswept in Time Orchids.  We now attend close to fifteen shows a year, where our plants and exhibits have won many awards