A different Valentine's Gift!

[Lesley Cox]

Maggi - having just joined up here at the forum - I can certainly vouch for the wonderful resource that is continuously being built on. Lots of knowledgeable people and plenty who have made me most welcome - despite all my newbie questions 

Newbie questions are welcomed by all the forumists Simon. After all, we were all newbies at one time. 

[Martin Baxendale]

Tom I really don't think it's helpful to be saying that someone who contributed to this thread is a t**t. I think it would be best if you were, in the interests of politeness, to edit that out of your comment as it could cause offence.

[evolutionplantsman]

Martin, Point taken and accepted. Please accept my apologies for losing the plot. I took offence on behalf of the wonderful lady who won the auction, who isn't a galanthophile, had never bought a snowdrop in her life until last week, spent a great deal of money on an immensely romantic gesture and doesn't deserve to be pilloried on a forum she's never heard of. Your comments were reasonable, well-argued and polite and I have no quarrel with them. I disagree with some of what you said but in an entirely collegial way. Cheers, Tom

[Maggi Young]

I believe Caroline Mabb's gift to her Dad, and also for the memory of the Grandfather she never knew- is immensely touching.  I confess I felt that it was a lot of money to pay for a "valentine" of the "usual" sort - but  this story is one of deep love an affection over the generations and it brought a lump to my throat.


Can anyone tell me where in the Express the piece is, please- I cannot find it.

[Martin Baxendale]

Thanks Tom. Probably best if we all put it behind us. Water under the bridge ... something we're getting  a lot of down this way.

[steve owen]

Nice story and thanks to Tim Harberd for the quote.

[Martin Baxendale]

With hindsight, I guess (sometimes sensational) national publicity for snowdrop growing and collecting goes hand in hand with the slow, hard slog for nurserymen of trying to meet demand in a genus which is so slow to propagate clonally, and can sometimes make the nurseryman's lot that little bit easier. I'm seeing it mainly from the buyer's perspective I suppose. 

[Martin Baxendale]

As someone who has been breeding and chipping snowdrops on an amateur basis for more years than I care to remember, I do appreciate the frustrations of nurserymen who are trying to propagate the newest and rarest varieties to satisfy a seemingly insatiable demand. I know how frustratingly slow it can  be to bulk up something new, and I'm lucky that I'm not having to do it for a living but just for the fun of it. 

To go off on another tack, it might solve a lot of problems for breeders, finders of new beauties and buyers alike if someone could perfect micropropagation for galanthus.

Does anyone out there have any news on that front? Maybe I should start a new thread on the subject to try to garner information on who, if anyone, is currently working on microprop for galanthus, and what success may or may not be being achieved.

[Martin Baxendale]

I believe that twitter and facebook have their uses for all sorts of things  but they can never provide the sort of resource that builds here in the form.
ANYONE can see these pages, no need for any registration, fully searchable, a cast of thousands, with access to some of the greatest plant experts in the world and the chance to see and discuss just about any plant.  The chance to add to an evergrowing solid resource is  unbeatable from where I stand !

Look at this thread - it's attracted wearing on for  1490 readers already - and if folk do register so they can post too, there are no adverts   - just a huge  collection of plant lovers. 

Maggi, I hope you didn't get the impression that I was suggesting the facebook galanthus group as an alternative to this forum, because I certainly wasn't. I was flagging it up as an additional and complimentary forum for snowdrop chat, not a challenger. Much of what is put up and discussed there (photos and chat) is the same stuff that appears here and often from the same contributors, just subtly different, sometimes taking different directions, sometimes the same. Vive la difference. N'est pas?

Seriously though, the facebook group doesn't pretend to be a resource and forum on the same scale as this one. But it is fun to hop from one to the other, like seeing the same group of people in different pubs with slightly different ambiences (but without having to keep forking out for rounds of drinks).

[Alan_b]

Mark Smyth reported on micropropagation trials at a university (I think) but I don't know if those ever came to anything.  I presume Thomson and Morgan will attempt something of the sort with their 'Elizabeth Harrison'. 

[Maggi Young]

No worries Martin, I didn't imagine you were suggesting such a thing.



 

[Martin Baxendale]

Mark Smyth reported on micropropagation trials at a university (I think) but I don't know if those ever came to anything.  I presume Thomson and Morgan will attempt something of the sort with their 'Elizabeth Harrison'.

Yes he did, but we haven't heard much about it since. T&M may be working on it behind the scenes if they're serious about selling rare snowdrops, or they may have just been satisfied with the free publicity they got over the auction and not be taking it any further. I hope it's the former rather than the latter. Maybe I'll contact them and ask.

[Martin Baxendale]

No worries Martin, I didn't imagine you were suggesting such a thing.

I thought you most likely wouldn't think that, but just wanted you to be sure that it wasn't what I was suggesting. 

[Brian Ellis]

Does anyone out there have any news on that front? Maybe I should start a new thread on the subject to try to garner information on who, if anyone, is currently working on microprop for galanthus, and what success may or may not be being achieved.

I vaguely recall mention of problems in growing them on?

[Tim Ingram]

What is chipping and twin scaling if not a sort of micropropagation? As a small specialist nurseryman I am ambivalent about propagating plants up in such large numbers because at the end of the day it actually reduces the 'value' of plants and makes it harder for small scale growers to do their own thing. On the other hand I spent amongst the most enjoyable time of my life working at John Innes where scientists were researching just these sorts of things, but primarily for improving the understanding and yields of food crops, and quality of husbandry (isn't that a good word when you view it's different meanings!). It seems to me we just all do our best on the basis of our own experience, and getting people together works best of all, which seems to have happened here in some curious way?