By james art 
A free Baton Rouge Plant Show and Sale will bring together specialty plants and plant lovers for the Fall Plant Society Jamboree on Saturday.
It will be held from 8 a.m. to noon at 12655 South Harrell’s Ferry Road, the former Harts Nursery, which is used for events like this, said jamboree coordinator Mark Messe.
Members of five local plant societies will be there to display their favorite plants: bromeliads, orchids, bonsai, carnivores and aroids – think philodendrons.
“I seem to be the only person dealing with carnivorous plants this weekend,” said Maze, who will bring the insect-hungry but exquisite-looking plants he grows from the southeastern United States.
The Plant Society Jamboree is held twice a year on South Harrell’s Ferry Road, although the fall show had to be canceled last year because of the continued drought this summer, Mees said.
In the spring, the jamboree is held the Saturday before Mother’s Day and features even more local plant societies, about a dozen, he said.
Each society represents specialty plants that are often only available for sale online, Mese said.
It’s a way, he said, to introduce the public to local plant societies and plant the seed for new members.
Mese hopes that a plant society, the native fern society, which is in danger of disappearing from the landscape, will get a new lease of life from the jamboree.
He plans to bring some of the staghorn ferns he grows to the show, along with a sign-up sheet.
“We might be able to revive the Fern Society,” he said.
For information about the jamboree or local plant societies, Mese can be reached at (225) 405-0762.