简介
Ingo Breuer 是一位德国植物学家，1955 年出生。他在植物学领域，特别是十二卷属植物的研究方面有着重要贡献。 Ingo Breuer 花了近十年时间收集并研究了 1000 多份关于十二卷属植物的参考文献，并于 1998 年出版了《十二卷属植物世界・第一卷》，之后又陆续发表了多篇论文，出版了《十二卷属植物世界・第二卷》，并在 2010 年和 2016 年更新了两次十二卷属植物的分类体系。他还发现了一些新的十二卷属植物物种，如 Haworthia groenewaldii 和 Haworthia truteriorum 等。 此外，Ingo Breuer 还经营着 eden – plants，通过网店 www.eden-plants.com 销售植物。他的植物收藏规模不断扩大，除了十二卷属植物外，他还爱上了生石花和有沟宝山属仙人掌，并进行种植和繁殖。
My Life as a ‘Cactophile’ – A Biographical Sketch
我的 “仙人掌痴迷者” 人生 – 一份生平简介
Ingo Breuer
I was born as Theodor Ingo Adamczyk in 1955 and since childhood I have had an interest in plants and nature. During my school holidays I spent a lot of time on the little farm of my uncle who worked as a gardener and taught me a lot of things about how to grow plants.
我原名西奥多·英戈·阿达姆奇克，1955年出生，自幼便对植物和大自然抱有浓厚兴趣。学校放假时，我会花大量时间待在叔叔的小农场里。叔叔是一名园丁，他教了我很多植物种植方面的知识。
When I was 10 years old, I got a cup with four flowering Mammillarias as a birthday gift from my mother. I grew them on the windowsill of a big window facing south. So I had good conditions to grow them successfully and they flowered again during the following year.
10岁生日时，母亲送了我一个花盆，里面种着四株开花的乳突球属仙人掌。我把它们放在朝南的大窗户窗台上养护。得益于良好的生长条件，这些仙人掌长势喜人，次年再次绽放花朵。
My schoolteacher knew about my interest in cacti and gave me a book written by Walter Haage (Freude mit Kakteen) which became my ‘bible’ for some years because it was 1965 and internet and Google did not exist at the time!
我的老师知道我喜欢仙人掌，便送给我一本瓦尔特·哈格所著的《Freude mit Kakteen》（《仙人掌的乐趣》）。在1965年那个没有互联网和谷歌的年代，这本书在好几年里都成了我的“圣经”！
In 1969 we got our own house with a big garden in Ibbenbüren where I was born (I did not grow up there) and I was happy to be allowed by my parents to construct a cold frame in which to grow my little cactus collection outside in the garden. It was about 3 m² but without heating. So I built a shelf in the cellar of our house with artificial light running on a time switch above the boards. My parents always supported me with my hobby and gave me space for me to develop it.
1969年，我们在我出生的伊本比伦拥有了一座带大花园的房子（不过我并非在那里长大）。父母允许我在花园里搭建一个冷床来培育我收集的少量仙人掌，这让我十分开心。这个冷床约3平方米，没有供暖设备。于是我在地下室搭了一个架子，架子上方装了带定时开关的人造灯。父母一直很支持我的爱好，也给了我发展爱好的空间。
Using this method, after the first winter I got so many flowers on my cacti when they started to grow again in the cold frame that I was encouraged to do much more and to build a bigger collection.
通过这种方式，第一个冬天过后，当仙人掌在冷床里重新开始生长时，开出了大量花朵。这激励着我投入更多精力，去收集更多仙人掌。
During my school holidays I worked in a nursery in order to save money for a real greenhouse. When I was 16 years old, I got in contact with the branch of the German Cactus and Succulent Society in Osnabrück and became a member of the society (since 49 years now). The branch members helped me a lot to increase my knowledge on the matter and on the number of plants in my collection. They also asked me to hold lectures for the branch because they knew about my deep interest! My first lecture was about how to grow Euphorbias!
学校放假期间，我在一家苗圃打工，为搭建一座真正的温室存钱。16岁时，我联系上了德国仙人掌与多肉植物协会奥斯纳布吕克分会，并成为该协会的会员（至今已有49年）。分会的成员们帮了我很多，不仅让我增长了相关知识，还帮我扩充了植物收藏量。他们知道我对仙人掌兴趣浓厚，还邀请我为分会举办讲座！我的第一场讲座主题是大戟属植物的种植方法。
The next important step was my new greenhouse, when I was 18 years old. It was 12 m² made of a solid steel construction covered with special glass intended for greenhouses. My father allowed me to connect it to the heating system of our house and a friend of mine, who was an electrical engineer, installed a fully automatic system to control heating and air ventilation.
18岁时，我迈出了重要的下一步——拥有了一座新温室。这座温室面积12平方米，采用坚固的钢结构，覆盖着专门用于温室的特殊玻璃。父亲同意我将温室接入家里的供暖系统，我的一位电气工程师朋友还帮我安装了全自动供暖和通风控制系统。
This enabled me to leave the greenhouse for some time on its own because my school days were over and I had obtained the necessary requirements to enter university. However, first I had to do two years of military service in the ambulance corps. During this time I could not be at home very often because I did my service in Bavaria (Mittenwald) which was about 900 km away from home (this was the time when I started to love the wonderful countryside of Bavaria). Before I left home for the military service, I taught my mother how to water and to maintain the cactus collection, this she was very willing to do because she liked to see all the beautiful flowers very much.
有了这个温室，我就能暂时离开，不用时刻照料。那时我已经高中毕业，达到了上大学的必要条件，但首先必须在救护队服两年兵役。服役期间我很少能回家，因为我被派往巴伐利亚州的米滕瓦尔德，那里离家约900公里（也就是从那时起，我开始爱上巴伐利亚美丽的乡村风光）。离家服兵役前，我教母亲如何给仙人掌浇水和养护，她非常乐意做这些事，因为她也很喜欢看这些美丽的花朵。
In 1976 I started my studies in Biology at the University of Bielefeld. During my time there I had a job as a student assistant at the little botanical garden there. Its head was also interested in cacti and I helped them to build a nice, well-presented collection. People at the university could see them easily when walking around the university building and so I got in contact with other cactus lovers.
1976年，我开始在比勒费尔德大学攻读生物学。在校期间，我在学校的小型植物园里担任学生助理。植物园主任也对仙人掌感兴趣，我帮他们打造了一批美观且陈列有序的仙人掌藏品。学校里的人在教学楼附近走动时，很容易看到这些仙人掌，我也因此结识了其他仙人掌爱好者。
Obviously, I joined the branch of the Cactus society in Bielefeld at that time. My first visit there was at their Christmas party where they had a quiz and tombola. The people there did not know me, of course! What should I say, I won the quiz and the first prize of the tombola too. This impressed them a lot and even after many years they spoke about that introduction of mine!
显然，当时我加入了仙人掌协会比勒费尔德分会。我第一次参加分会活动是在他们的圣诞派对上，派对上有知识问答和抽奖游戏。当然，那里的人都不认识我！不过说来也巧，我不仅赢得了知识问答，还抽中了抽奖的一等奖。这给他们留下了深刻印象，即便多年后，他们还会提起我那次“惊艳亮相”！
In 1983 I finished my studies in Bielefeld and moved to Düren because I supported Brigitte and Jörg Piltz during that time while they were establishing a new nursery there. My plants were still in my greenhouse in my parents’ garden but during my studies I replaced the first one with a bigger one with an area of 36 m² which I had obtained from Brigitte and Jörg Piltz, because when they moved from their old place to Düren, they built a much bigger one. I got in contact with the Piltz family because of my interest in Gymnocalycium, which started in the mid-70s. At that time Jörg Piltz was one of the leading experts (and still is) with a lot of experience from all the trips that he made with Brigitte and others in South America.
1983年，我完成了在比勒费尔德大学的学业，搬到了迪伦，因为当时布里吉特·皮尔茨和约尔格·皮尔茨夫妇正在那里筹建一座新苗圃，我前去帮忙。我的植物仍放在父母花园的温室里，但在求学期间，我把第一个温室换成了一个更大的——面积36平方米，这个温室是从布里吉特和约尔格·皮尔茨那里得到的。因为他们从旧址搬到迪伦后，建了一个更大的苗圃。我是在70年代中期开始对裸萼球属仙人掌产生兴趣的，也正因如此，我结识了皮尔茨一家。当时约尔格·皮尔茨就是该领域的顶尖专家之一（如今依然是），他和布里吉特等人多次前往南美洲考察，积累了丰富的经验。
My second interest during the time of my studies was in Mammillarias. I had close contact with two of the founders of the ‘Arbeitskreis für Mammillarienfreunde’, which was established in 1977 in Münster by nine persons. From the end of the 70s until moving to Düren, I was the editor of the Journal of that Society for some time.
求学期间，我第二个感兴趣的仙人掌品种是乳突球属。1977年，九个人在明斯特成立了“乳突球爱好者工作组”，我与该组织的两位创始人保持着密切联系。从70年代末到搬到迪伦前，我还担任过该组织期刊的编辑，为期一段时间。
As mentioned already, my plants were still in my parents’ garden but my first flat in Düren had a small conservatory which unfortunately was not very sunny. So I could not grow cacti there. Since some time I also had an interest in small Aloes and Haworthias and, by accident, I got about 50 different offsets of Haworthia from a friend who had obtained them from the botanical garden in Bonn. So 1983 was the start of a very successful and intensive establishment of a big Haworthia collection.
如前所述，我的植物还在父母的花园里，而我在迪伦的第一个公寓虽有一个小暖房，但可惜光照不足，无法用来种植仙人掌。那段时间，我还对小型芦荟和十二卷属植物产生了兴趣。一次偶然的机会，一位朋友从波恩植物园得到了约50株不同品种的十二卷属植物侧芽，他把这些侧芽送给了我。于是，1983年成了我成功且专注地打造大型十二卷属植物收藏的开端。
In 1984 I started my first, well-paid job as a quality inspector in a paper manufacturing company in Düren which enabled me to rent a house with a garden where I could build a new greenhouse and bring my old collection to the new place.
1984年，我找到了第一份薪水不错的工作——在迪伦一家造纸厂担任质量检查员。这份工作让我有能力租下一座带花园的房子，我可以在花园里搭建新温室，把之前收藏的植物都搬过来。
A friend of mine and new neighbour in that small village near Düren was the chairman of the cactus branch in Bonn and so I joined that branch and not the branch in Düren.
在迪伦附近的这个小村庄里，我的一位朋友兼新邻居是仙人掌协会波恩分会的主席，因此我加入了波恩分会，而非迪伦分会。
In 1990 I got married to Maria Breuer, a belly dancer whom I had met at a party. This was the time when I changed my name to Ingo Breuer. I learned a lot about this subject and we spent much time on events all over the country. In another small village close to Düren we found a house that we could buy and I spent much time in renovating it. I also built three new greenhouses and I never interrupted my efforts to enlarge my collection.
1990年，我与玛丽亚·布罗伊尔结婚，她是一名肚皮舞演员，我们在一次派对上相识。也就是在这时，我把名字改成了英戈·布罗伊尔。我从玛丽亚那里学到了很多关于肚皮舞的知识，我们也花了很多时间参加全国各地的肚皮舞活动。后来，我们在迪伦附近的另一个小村庄找到了一座可以购买的房子，我花了大量时间翻新这座房子，还新建了三座温室，并且从未停止扩充我的植物收藏。
During the 80s, Ernst and Marita Specks (formerly Exotica Specks) organised conventions about succulents where very famous speakers like Prof. Werner Rauh from Heidelberg held lectures.
80年代期间，恩斯特·施佩克斯和玛丽塔·施佩克斯夫妇（曾经营“Exotica Specks”品牌）组织了多场多肉植物大会，邀请了诸如海德堡大学的维尔纳·劳教授等知名人士来做讲座。
There I met people from the former East German Succulent Society (Fachgesellschaft andere Sukkulenten) and we started a group interested in Aloe plants. At that time, I took over the job as the editor of their journal together with Hans-Jürgen Thorwarth (a famous artist drawing plants). We started to change the name of the journal into ‘Avonia’, which still exists and is now a very famous bilingual journal, published by a couple of idealists. We had a few very nice meetings continuing for some years.
在这些大会上，我结识了前东德多肉植物协会（Fachgesellschaft andere Sukkulenten）的成员，我们一起成立了一个芦荟植物兴趣小组。当时，我和汉斯-于尔根·托尔瓦思（一位著名的植物绘画艺术家）共同接手了该协会期刊的编辑工作。我们将期刊名称改为《Avonia》，这份期刊至今仍在发行，如今已成为一本非常有名的双语期刊，由几位热心人士负责出版。在之后的几年里，我们还举办了多次愉快的聚会。
During this time I got in contact with Dr. Raymond Dedeyne (from Wommelgem, Belgium), who got me in contact with Cok Grootscholten (from Honselersdijk, Netherlands). Both are Haworthia collectors and they had contacts all over the world, especially with people in South Africa. They had a lot of very rare material which nobody else had and luckily they propagated their material which one could obtain from them at reasonable prices. This was the start of my collection with good material with scientifically relevant data.
在此期间，我结识了比利时沃默尔海姆的雷蒙德·德戴恩博士，他又介绍我认识了荷兰洪瑟勒尔斯迪克的科克·格鲁特肖尔滕。两人都是十二卷属植物收藏家，在世界各地都有人脉，尤其是在南非。他们拥有许多独一无二的稀有品种，幸运的是，他们会繁殖这些稀有品种，而且人们能以合理的价格从他们那里买到。这也成了我收藏优质、具备科学相关数据的十二卷属植物的开端。
Another important step towards enlarging my knowledge about Haworthias, was my contacts with people from the University of Cologne (Dr. Joachim Thiede and his Professor, Dr. Jürgens). I joined their lectures about ecology of succulents in South Africa and similar matters. This made me look for myself at how the plants look in habitat, what their growing conditions are and so on.
在扩充十二卷属植物知识方面，另一个重要的契机是我结识了科隆大学的人士——约阿希姆·蒂德博士及其导师于尔根斯博士。我听了他们关于南非多肉植物生态等主题的讲座。这让我开始主动去了解这些植物在原生环境中的形态、生长条件等信息。
When I was 40 years old, in 1995, I gave myself a present – a trip to South Africa joining some of Prof. Jürgens’ students. I had a three weeks’ excursion with them to different places with quartz pebble fields in the Little Karoo where they made investigations of all the relevant factors and why the vegetation there is so different from the surrounding area with sandstone or shale. Such places were only known to them so far from the Knersvlakte area. The results of this excursion (and others) were the material of the doctorial dissertation of Dr. Ute Schmiedel (now from the University of Hamburg).
1995年，我40岁时，送给自己一份礼物——加入于尔根斯教授的学生团队，一同前往南非旅行。我和他们在小卡鲁地区的多个石英砾石地带进行了为期三周的考察。学生们在那里研究各种相关因素，以及为何该地区的植被与周边砂岩或页岩地区的植被存在巨大差异。在此之前，人们只在克内斯夫拉克特地区发现过这类石英砾石地带。这次（及其他几次）考察的结果，成了乌特·施米德尔博士（现任职于汉堡大学）博士论文的素材。
As I had no experience on how to find Haworthias in nature, and none of the students did, I was walking around looking everywhere while the students took their measurements. It took me three days to find my first Haworthia (now I know that the places around and in the quartz pebble fields nearby, in which I was looking was not a good area to look for Haworthias) but, at least, I found H. viscosa and I still have a piece of it in my greenhouse.
我没有在野外寻找十二卷属植物的经验，学生们也没有。所以在学生们进行测量时，我四处走动，到处寻找。过了三天，我才找到第一株十二卷属植物（现在我知道，当时我在附近石英砾石地带及周边寻找的区域，其实并不是寻找十二卷属植物的理想地点）。但至少，我找到了粘毛十二卷（H. viscosa），如今我的温室里还种着它的一株后代。
During this trip, we got an invitation from the head of the Cape Nature Reserve to join their annual meeting in ‘Die Hell’, a very lonesome camp high up in the Swartberg Mountains, and I did some climbing on the slopes ofthe Swartberg where I found many other succulents but no Haworthias at all. After the meeting we went to the Laingsburg area and there I found my first Haworthias of real interest without any help from others, H. arachnoidea, lockwoodii and scabrispina.
在这次旅行中，我们收到了开普自然保护区负责人的邀请，参加他们在“Die Hell”举办的年度会议。“Die Hell”是斯瓦特山脉高处一个非常偏僻的营地。我还在斯瓦特山脉的山坡上爬了一段路，途中发现了许多其他多肉植物，却完全没找到十二卷属植物。会议结束后，我们前往莱恩斯堡地区，在那里，我无需他人帮助，首次找到了几种自己真正感兴趣的十二卷属植物——蛛网十二卷（H. arachnoidea）、洛克伍德十二卷（H. lockwoodii）和粗糙十二卷（H. scabrispina）。
Our host of the Cape Nature Reserve invited me to join him at his home in Cape Town because I told him that I needed to look at some preserved specimens in the herbarium since I had decided to take the matter in a more scientific manner and I had already started collecting all the original descriptions and other relevant literature on Haworthias.
由于我告诉开普自然保护区的那位接待方负责人，我决定以更科学的方式研究十二卷属植物，且已开始收集所有关于该属植物的原始描述及其他相关文献，因此需要查阅植物标本馆里的一些馆藏标本。他便邀请我去他位于开普敦的家中做客。
One person who supported me a lot in getting all this material (no internet at that time) was a former student of Biology at the University of Aachen, Wolfgang Borgmann, now working as an environmental officer for a big company.
在获取这些资料的过程中（当时还没有互联网），有一个人帮了我大忙——他叫沃尔夫冈·博格曼，曾是亚琛大学的生物学学生，如今在一家大公司担任环境专员。
It took me nearly ten years to collect and study more than 1000 references about Haworthias. In 1998 I decided that it was the right time to publish the results of my research and the reasons for this can be found in the foreword of my book ‘World of Haworthias, Vol.1’ (now out of print):
我花了近十年时间，收集并研究了1000多份关于十二卷属植物的参考文献。1998年，我认为是时候将自己的研究成果出版了，背后的原因可以在我的著作《World of Haworthias, Vol.1》（《十二卷属植物世界·第一卷》，现已绝版）的序言中找到：
‘……The Lexicon of Succulent Plants by H. Jacobsen contained numerous brief descriptions of Haworthias but I found these difficult to match in order to classify my own plant material. I had great expectations for M.B. Bayer’s Haworthia book, published in 1982. In this book he reduced the abundant number of Haworthia names, supporting his findings with constructive and convincing explanations. The excellent photographs helped to remove doubts in making comparisons with my own plants but, nevertheless, I had now become even more curious and wanted to extend my knowledge further. The Haworthia book by J. Pilbeam, published in 1983, had many excellent pictures and contained some new names. These names more or less referred to remarkable forms that were of special interest to collectors. Accordingly, in my opinion, they are not very helpful towards a better understanding of the genus. The book by C.L. Scott, published in 1985, confused many Haworthia collectors because he presented a rather different classification to that of Bayer. Scott did not accept the three subgenera erected by Uitewaal and used by Bayer. The detailed descriptions, supported by photographs and distribution maps, corresponded to existing plants available in cultivation but I could not agree with most of Scott’s opinions. Therefore, these three books could not give me satisfactory answers to all of my questions and this situation was the inspiration for my own investigations. Starting in 1989, I decided to collect and analyse all available references published on Haworthias. This book is the culmination of my preliminary findings…………’
H. Jacobsen 所著的《多肉植物大全》（The Lexicon of Succulent Plants）中包含大量关于十二卷属植物的简要描述，但我发现这些描述很难用于对自己收藏的植物样本进行分类。 我对 M.B. Bayer’s 1982年出版的十二卷属植物专著寄予厚望。在这本书中，他精简了繁多的十二卷属植物名称，并以具有建设性且有说服力的解释支撑自己的观点。书中精美的图片也帮助我在对比自己的植物时消除了疑虑，但即便如此，我反而变得更加好奇，想要进一步扩充自己的知识。 J. Pilbeam1983年出版的十二卷属植物著作中有许多出色的图片，还收录了一些新的植物名称。这些名称或多或少指向一些形态特别的品种，虽深受收藏者关注，但在我看来，它们对深入理解该属植物并无太大帮助。 C.L. Scott 1985年出版的著作则让许多十二卷属植物收藏者感到困惑，因为他提出的分类体系与拜耳的体系差异极大。斯科特不认可由乌特瓦尔建立、并被拜耳采用的三个亚属分类。尽管书中辅以图片和分布图的详细描述与目前栽培的现有植物相符，但我无法认同斯科特的大部分观点。 因此，这三本书都无法为我所有的疑问提供满意答案，而这种情况也成了我开展自主研究的契机。从1989年开始，我决定收集并分析所有已发表的关于十二卷属植物的参考文献。本书便是我初步研究成果的结晶……”
Apart from my literature work, I wanted to enlarge my knowledge of Haworthias in the field. Fortunately I got in contact with a field researcher and grower of plants, Vincent de Vries from Oudtshoorn in South Africa. In 2000 I started my second trip, first together with Vincent in the Oudtshoorn area and later joined by David Morton Cumming from Bathurst. I did the second part of the trip only with David in Port Elizabeth – Humansdorp area. By means of this trip I got a better insight into the ‘World of Haworthias’ and it encouraged me to make more such trips. During the next few years I did another two trips per year and so I got a good overview on the most important elements of these plants.
除了文献研究，我还希望通过野外考察扩充对十二卷属植物的认知。幸运的是，我结识了南非奥茨胡恩的一位野外研究员兼植物种植者——文森特·德弗里斯。2000年，我开启了第二次南非之旅：起初与文森特一同在奥茨胡恩地区考察，后来来自巴瑟斯特的大卫·莫顿·卡明也加入了我们；旅程的后半段，我则单独与大卫在伊丽莎白港至哈曼斯多普地区考察。这次旅行让我对“十二卷属植物世界”有了更深入的了解，也激励我进行更多此类考察。在接下来的几年里，我每年都会进行两次考察，从而对该属植物最重要的特征有了全面的认识。
I continued to publish many papers since then, another book (vol.2 of ‘World of Haworthias’), two updated classifications in 2010 and 2016 and so on. Until now, Haworthias are still very important in my mind.
从那以后，我陆续发表了多篇论文，还出版了另一本著作（《十二卷属植物世界·第二卷》），并在2010年和2016年更新了两次十二卷属植物的分类体系等。直至今日，十二卷属植物在我心中依然占据着重要地位。
When I divorced in 2002, Ernst Specks, whom I know since the end of 80s, made me an offer to rent his old greenhouse in Golkrath, while he was building an even bigger one in Hoven, the next village, because he knew that I was short of space for my collection. I was limited with three small greenhouses (50 m²) on my private property where I lived with my ex-wife and Ernst offered me a 300 m² greenhouse, fully equipped, for a very reasonable lease, an offer which I could not refuse. 15th July 2002 was the start of eden-plants.
2002年我离婚后，自80年代末就认识的恩斯特·施佩克斯向我伸出了援手。当时他正在邻村霍芬建造一座更大的温室，于是提出让我租用他在戈尔克拉特的旧温室——因为他知道我的植物收藏空间不足。我和前妻居住的私人住宅里，只有三座总面积50平方米的小温室，空间十分有限。而恩斯特愿意以非常合理的租金，将一座300平方米、设备齐全的温室租给我，这个提议我无法拒绝。2002年7月15日，“eden-plants”（伊甸园植物）就此诞生。
I moved my collection to Ernst’s greenhouse in Golkrath and rented a small flat nearby for my belongings which I had brought with me from the house in which I lived with my ex-wife. In the meantime, I learnt more computer techniques and started a new profession as an IT-consultant testing SAP-software for insurance companies, which was a totally different matter from that which I had ever done before. I was employed by a big German company (msg) which had its development department in Passau about 700 km away from my new place. This was a big challenge for me and my ability of organisation but I could manage working in Passau and building up a big collection, much bigger than before.
我把所有植物收藏搬到了恩斯特位于戈尔克拉特的温室里，还在附近租了一间小公寓，存放从之前和前妻同住的房子里带来的个人物品。在此期间，我学习了更多计算机技术，开启了新的职业生涯——成为一名IT顾问，为保险公司测试SAP软件。这与我以往从事的工作完全不同。我受雇于德国一家大公司（msg），该公司的研发部门位于帕绍，距离我的新住处约700公里。这对我和我的组织能力来说是个不小的挑战，但我成功平衡了在帕绍的工作与扩充植物收藏（规模比以往大得多）这两件事。
Of course, to cover the running costs I started to sell more plants then I did before but because of my job being so far away, I could only do it with a web shop (www.eden-plants.com) . Since there was internet then I could do it and keep in contact with my customers from anywhere!
当然，为了支付温室的运营成本，我开始比以往更多地出售植物。但由于工作地点较远，我只能通过网店（www.eden-plants.com） 销售。当时互联网已经普及，这让我得以实现远程销售，还能随时随地与客户保持联系！
I do not know how it happened, but already after two years, the big greenhouse that I rented from Ernst was running out of space. Unbelievable! This meant that either I had to stop enlarging the sales area or to reduce my private collection!
我不知道为什么会这样，但仅仅两年后，我从恩斯特那里租来的那座大温室就又不够用了。简直不可思议！这意味着我要么停止扩大销售用植物的种植面积，要么就得缩减自己的私人收藏！
During my time in Golkrath two other important things made their way into my collector’s life! At that time I had also got in contact with Uwe Beyer (Cono’s Paradise) and, because of his thousands of beautiful Lithops, I fell in love with them! Apart from a short interruption, I still grow and propagate them. My second new love is Sulcorebutias, which are very handsome growers and fascinate everyone, not only cactophiles, with their colourful flowers, many of which are bicoloured and some have even three 3 colours!
在戈尔克拉特生活期间，有另外两件重要的事走进了我的收藏生涯！当时我还结识了乌韦·拜尔（经营“Cono’s Paradise”品牌），他培育的数千株美丽的生石花让我瞬间爱上了这个品种！除了短暂中断过一段时间，我至今仍在种植和繁殖生石花。我的第二个“新欢”是有沟宝山属仙人掌，这类仙人掌长势健壮，花朵色彩艳丽——许多是双色花，有些甚至是三色花——不仅吸引仙人掌爱好者，几乎能让所有人为之着迷！
In those days, Uwe bought cacti collections given up by their former owners for many reasons and so he bought two important Sulcorebutia collections, one of which was that of Willy Fischer (WF), who had many original clones from Heinz Swoboda (HS), besides his own collected plants. The other was that of Edmund Kirschnek (EK) and I took most of the material that was left. That was the start of a new big collection, now with about 4000 different records and more than 12,000 plants.
那时候，乌韦会收购因各种原因被原主人放弃的仙人掌收藏。他收购了两个重要的有沟宝山属仙人掌收藏：一个来自威利·菲舍尔（WF），菲舍尔除了自己收集的植株外，还拥有许多海因茨·斯沃博达（HS）培育的原始无性系品种；另一个来自埃德蒙·基施内克（EK），我接手了其中大部分剩余的植株。这也成了我新的大型收藏的开端，如今这个收藏已有约4000个不同品种记录，植株数量超过1.2万株。
Again it was the twist of fate that drew my attention to an advertisement which I saw at the bank. It was in 2004 and it was offering a house with a nursery at the back (4 greenhouses with an area of 1,500 m²) at a purchase price which was only for the house and property, the greenhouses being offered for free! It was in Oberbruch, only 10 km away from Golkrath. So I managed to buy it. But you cannot imagine what a hard job it was moving all the plants which filled up a 300 m² greenhouse! I did it all by myself with my small caravan, not counting how many trips I had to make! But 300 m² of plants in an area of 1,500 m² looked quite empty! So I started growing and propagating as much as possible. I managed to fill it up. In 2005 I was ready to open the nursery to the public; the official date was 15th July 2005. Now I think that I have enough plants in my private collections and for sale. I have now retired from my job as a Senior IT consultant and shall use my time to document my collection resulting in some nice publications. Then I must think about reducing my collection to the size that it was when I started 50 years earlier. I like the plants too much and I want to leave them in a good condition when I have to leave the planet in some years from now.
命运再次转折——我在银行看到了一则广告，这则广告吸引了我的注意。那是在2004年，广告上出售一套房子，房子后面附带一个苗圃（包含4座温室，总面积1500平方米），售价仅包含房屋和土地，温室相当于免费赠送！这套房产位于奥伯布鲁赫，距离戈尔克拉特约10公里。于是我设法买下了它。但你根本想象不到，要把装满300平方米温室的所有植物搬过去有多难！我用自己的小拖车独自完成了搬运，都记不清跑了多少趟！不过，300平方米的植物放在1500平方米的空间里，看起来还是相当空旷！所以我开始尽可能多地种植和繁殖植物，最终把温室都填满了。2005年，我准备好将苗圃向公众开放，正式开放日期定在2005年7月15日。如今，我认为自己的私人收藏和待售植物数量已经足够。我已从高级IT顾问的岗位上退休，接下来会把时间用在记录我的植物收藏上，希望能出版一些优质的著作。之后，我必须考虑将收藏规模缩减到50年前刚开始时的大小。我太爱这些植物了，希望在未来某天离开这个世界时，能把它们完好地托付出去。
I think the story of my life as a cactophile reminds some readers of their own story. I can say that I was a very lucky person to get so much support from so many people and I am still glad to be able to grow my beloved plants!
我想，我作为仙人掌爱好者的人生故事，或许会让一些读者想起自己的经历。我可以说，能得到这么多人的支持，我非常幸运，至今仍为能种植自己心爱的植物而感到欣慰！
Acknowledgement
My greatest thanks go to my friend George Borg Marks from Malta, who supported me a lot in the past few years with maintaining the plants in the greenhouse, with very lively discussions on all aspects of the matter and also with checking my paperwork!
致谢
我要向来自马耳他的朋友乔治·博格·马克斯表达最诚挚的感谢。过去几年里，他给了我很多支持：帮我照料温室里的植物、就相关领域的各种问题与我展开热烈讨论，还帮我校对文书工作！
email: info@eden-plants.com 花园地址：http://www.eden-plants.com https://www.sulcopassion.be/