donations

We at EPRIC are completely committed to epiphytic plants and their hybrids. In March 1997 Epric started with a very small collection, in that period we had to place our plants with friends and growers. We were not able to maintain an own collection or rent a larger greenhouse. As the years did pass, we get more and more involved in several communities and projects.

We only wanted to grow epiphytic plants and their hybrids, we did get more and more families we could not resist. We would love to build greenhouses for every family of plants such as the epiphytic fuchsias, ferns, Peperomias,  the Hoya or waxflowers and the large number of orchids which do grow  epiphytically.

We are proud to have some of the largest collections of some groups already, especially the epiphytic cacti and their hybrids are found in large numbers. The Rhipsalis and Lepismium collection does belong to the largest in the world.We are proud to have some of the largest collections of some groups already, especially the epiphytic cacti and their hybrids are found in large numbers. The Rhipsalis and Lepismium collection does belong to the largest in the world.

With the increasing of plants, every year we do face the problems involved with it. Not only the fact that we have space problems for all
our plants but also the problem that we have to less people to mantain the collection. And finally the money problem is always there. It is so frustrating that we can not do a lot we want, because there is always a lack of money: how hard the board and all the volunteers are working, some nearly 40 hours a week. Epric does depend on these volunteers as nobody does get paid for all his or hers work. Sometimes people think that people at EPRICs do get a lot of money, in fact all royalties for books and cd-roms from all the authors are given back to the foundation. With the increasing of plants, every year we do face the problems involved with it. Not only the fact that we have space problems for all our plants but also the problem that we have to less people to mantain the collection. And finally the money problem is always there. It is so frustrating that we can not do a lot we want, because there is always a lack of money: how hard the board and all the volunteers are working, some nearly 40 hours a week. Epric does depend on these volunteers as nobody does get paid for all his or hers work. Sometimes people think that people at EPRICs do get a lot of money, in fact all royalties for books and cd-roms from all the authors are given back to the foundation.

We are still in a rented greenhouse which costs us a fortune every month, we would rather be in an own greenhouse. All the money we do spend in improving the growing conditions for our plants is in fact money spend for the owner of the greenhouses. We are still in a rented greenhouse which costs us a fortune every month, we would rather be in an own greenhouse. All the money we do spend in improving the growing conditions for our plants is in fact money spend for the owner of the greenhouses.

Sometimes we do hear remarks such as 'well you have published so many books at eprics, well thats bringing in some money'. Of course it does but you have to imagine that one booktitle costs us about Euro 20,000 to publish and -unfortenately- they are not sold within one month. Some titles are 'out of print'after 3-4 years, meaning that we do get the invested money back on that time.

Yes we know we ask sometimes to much. We know that some people think, why should I give something or 'here they are again'. But realise that we do something for the different communities. We also want to educate children from the local shools, to let them grow up with plants. Something we cannot do at the moment. We also want to put the collection open for the public. To give the people an idea what we do, how we do it and what benefits the communities do hav from our endless research work.

We have done a lot of research projects, we have found a cure for Erwinia, we have found out how difficult to grow species can be propagated. We have done the Schlumbergera projects, a project to make an inventory of all the christmas cacti in the world. We also help to protect natural growing habitats of epiphytic plants. 

In January this year we were hit hard by the storms. A lot of damage was to the greenhouse and to some of our plants. At that time the owner of the greenhouse was not doing much so we had to pay for nearly all damages to the greenhouse (more than Euro 10,000)  to keep our collections in tact as much as possilbe. Some individuals and some epi growers did help us out financially and without that help we wouldn't have survived. Thanx to Jim Hunter(GotEpis), Don Cravalho(Epiphyllumworld), Elisabeth Vogel and many others.

What are our plans for the future? We need to find or build a new greenhouse, a greenhosue which belongs to EPRIC. A greenhouse were all investments we have to make, are benefitting EPRIC and the plants in our collection.

So we hope you will help us in furfulling our wish: the own greenhouse.  Please help us with this as we do see no way how we can do this alone. There are several waysyou can donate money:

1. We have a webshop at EPRICs with the publications we sell.

2. At the same webshop we have a 'donation part'. You can already donate an amount from Euro 1 upwards. Also small amounts do count! There is a possibility to donate with Visa or transfer to our bankaccount. In the Netherlands we can not accept personal checks (unfortenately).

If you grow a lot of tropical plants, or if you are a seller of these plants, why not selling our publications too? (For this please send an email to epric@tiscali.nl )

We know we ask a lot.  But if you are in the possibility to help us, please help us out.
Here is the link to the webpage again: http://www.epric.org/

With best regards,

Epric Foundation board

Menno van der Hoff