A nordic Hepatica forum

[Joakim B]

Hepaticas are interesting and depending on where You live You may grow them differently.
There is a new (1 month old) forum dealing with growing Hepaticas in the nordic countries.
I do not know if that differs a lot between southern Sweden and northen Germany so there may be some interest here as well. Some of the text is in English ;particularly the text about nordic cultivars might be extra fun.
Maybe the climate in some parts of Scotland is similar or NZ so there might be some for many more than expected.

Here is the forum
http://www.hepatica.org/phpBB3/index.php

If this is considered as bad manner showing other forum so please take this away.
There is no selling so no risk in looking

Kind regards
Joakim

[Maggi Young]

A most interesting site, Joakim.... I believe I see that quite a few Forumists familiar here are involved in this project.  I am so pleased to find the English pages, my thanks to those who have provided those!!

[Joakim B]

Maggi I agree that the pages in English are very interesting.
I think that they would appreciate members that would have similar growing conditions like around the Baltic and Northen Scotland or NZ or US and Canada about hardy cultivars and would be willing to miss some information since it would be in Scandinavian. I have no credit in this and it was created by Norwegians so much of the Scandinavian language is in Norwedish. Part of the aim with this forum is to try to breed nice forms that are hardy by folks testing to breed with what they have and with what others have by exchanging pollen and maybe plants.

The gallery is so far with 150 pictures and most is about hardy cultivars I think.

Hope people enjoy it
Kind regards
Joakim

[EinMy]

Hello to Maggi and Joakim,
The Nordic Hepatica Forum was originally an initiative directed towards the Nordic countries. The fact is however that Norwegians do not know a lot about what is grown in Sweden or Denmark, and as for the Swedes, they generally grow "doubles" without cultivar names. In addition nobody seems to remember that the Hepatica is also a native of Finland. So bringing people together might sort out the interest in cultivar history, in short, what do we really grow in the Nordic countries?

The interest in Japenese Hepaticas has risen to a level one could hardly imagine ten years ago, and people of the Nordic countries also find photos of spectacular Hepaticas with strange names on the net. But these plants are expensive and they are not hardy enough outdoors. So why not channel this wave of interest in Hepaticas towards our own hardy, native plants? I really doubt that they are less variable genetically than Japanese Hepaticas are. The Nordic Hepatica Forum therefore is a forum established to stimulate popular interest in our own plants mainly, but of course anything having a label resembling the spelling of H E P A T I C A is of interest to us.

Regards
Einar

[Maggi Young]

I wish success to this venture, Einar, I am sure it is worthwhile. As you say, there seems no reason why there should not be as much genetic diversity in the European Hepaticas andthere could be great future in developing garden hardy forms.... something which we can all look forward to with happy anticipation.

[Bjarne]

Hi Maggi
Thanks for the encouragement
I hope that people are not only sitting and hoping that there will be nice hardy Hepaticas coming from the "North". Those who have similar conditions around Europe and the rest of the world are more than welcome to participate to discuss about growing Hepatica when there is a Winter with frost involved. They are also welcome to take part in breeding attempts by sharing and trading pollen and seed and also plants when possible. The Japanese have spend some time to get the lovely plants they have so by being more people trying to breed there are better chances to get some really nice ones
If they have any cultivars that they know their origin of they are also very welcome to share that history.
If there is anything of special interest that anyone interested do not understand there will for sure be possibilities to have some parts translated to English.
Hope more are interested in breeding hardy Hepaticas.

Best regards
Bjarne