This is one of those simple blog posts where I write about a frustrating problem, and how I worked around it.

The Culprit

iPhoto 11 and it’s Calendar feature.

The Issue

When you try to import iCal dates into a Calendar, it frustratingly deletes events if they “collide” on the same date.

Example

Let’s say you have two iCal calendars, one for your family birthdays and events, and one for your friends birthdays and events.  Let’s also say that your brother is born on April 11th, and your friend is born on April 11th.

When you import both iCal calendars into iPhoto, only one of the birthday events will show up.  This does not happen if both birthdays are in the same calendar – only if they are in two different calendars.

What’s worse is that this also affects the native support for holidays.  So any friends or family born on July 4th are definitely out of luck.

Solution / Workaround

It’s not perfect, but here is my solution:

1. Uncheck the holidays checkbox on the calendar import.  This gets you one “clean” calendar import that won’t hit the bug.
2. Go to iCal and export each of the calendars that you want to add to your iPhoto calendar.
3. In iCal, create a new calendar called “2012 iPhoto Calendar” or something like that.
4. In iCal, import each of the calendars you exported, in the order you want them to appear.  Add them to the new “2012 iPhoto Calendar” calendar.
5. Once you are done, quit iPhoto.  It only detects iCal changes at launch.
6. Launch iPhoto
7. Import the new iCal calendar “2012 iPhoto Calendar”.  All your dates will appear, in the order you combined them.

Hope this helps someone out there.  For my rather elaborate family calendar efforts (which involve five separate family calendars of birthdays, anniversaries, and key dates), this was an essential fix.