RARE Cosmos seeds needing responsible homes

[Brian Ellis]

If it's being re-introduced Brian, are these non-fertile, micropropagated plants or is there another seed source somewhere.

I'll try and find out Lesley

Brian, if a plant that is extinct in the wild (only surviving in cultivation) is in the pink (?) List, what does it take to include it in the Red one?

Alberto I thought the NCCPG had it's own pink list ... but it may be red

[Brian Ellis]

Taken from The Plant Heritage Action plan for conservation of plants in cultivation:

William Thompson, the founder of
Thompson and Morgan Seed Merchants,
first brought this tuberous rooted halfhardy
perennial to Britain in 1835.
Although it received an Award of
Garden Merit from the RHS in 1938, and
despite velvet maroon flowers with the
distinctive chocolate perfume it
disappeared from gardens. Living stock
had been preserved at the Royal Botanic
Gardens, Kew since the 1970s and during
the 1990s material was micropropagated
and cryogenically preserved. Until
recently Cosmos atrosanguineus was
thought to be extinct in the wild and
Kew’s material was repatriated to Mexico
to attempt reintroduction. However, the
present gene pool in cultivation only
derives from one or two introductions
and as cross-pollination is required to
produce viable seeds it was not certain
whether the reintroduction programme
would be successful.
All is not lost, though, since from New
Zealand has come the first instance of a
self-fertile clone, registered for Plant
Breeders Rights in New Zealand as ‘Pinot
Noir’. Plants have also more recently
been rediscovered in the wild.

[Lesley Cox]

The bastard, that seed came from.....ME.

[Ezeiza]

Thanks, Brian!

Lesley, is that true?

In any case, if this fertile New Zealand form kees on going there is always the chance to retry reintroductions, which are difficult and take a number of attempts

[Lesley Cox]

To be quite honest Alberto, I don't know and as yet I've not seen any release of the plant. However, I did send seed to a North Island man who has bred and released many many plants and put PVR status on them. They include sweet peas, dahlias, perennial petunias and others.

What will be interesting to see is whether the 'Pinot Noir' form is continuously grown from seed, or whether a fertile seedling is being micropropagated, in which case it may not remain fertile for very long!

[Ezeiza]

The material that has been tissue cultured is the one that is sterile and large flowered. It was useful to clean it of eventual virus infections.

[arillady]

Lesley I can feel the heat from here
and I don't blame you.
Recognition should be on the right shoulders.

[Lesley Cox]

I asked yesterday at a couple of local garden centres if they had Cosmos atrosanguinea at all or in a new clone called 'Pinot Noir' but no-one knew anything about it. Said they might have some more plants in the spring. Pinot Noir being the latest of NZ's fashionable wines is being applied to many plants. A dahlia, a phormium, a cosmos apparently, et al. Personally, I'm happiest drinking it or munching the small but intensely sweet grapes. They make a great grape jelly.

[Stephen Vella]

Lesley I googled cosmos pinot noir and found http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20100083412
have a read.

Interesting to see how one can cash in on a form of a species and want to place plant breeders rights...must be worth somebodys trouble...its about $$..crap!

[annew]

It doesn't look distinct from any of the others to me. 

[Lesley Cox]

Thanks for the link Stephen. Very interesting indeed, and yes, it was Keith Hammett to whom I gave seed. I wonder where the "cultivated area in Dunedin" is, where pollinations are carried out. My garden maybe??

[Brian Ellis]

Thanks for the seeds Anne, just to let you know that of the ten seeds you sent I now have eight showing their first true leaves

[Lesley Cox]

My thanks too Anne. All but one have germinated and are coming along nicely. I'll need to be aware of the temp now as we had the first frost this morning, maybe -2 or -3 degsC. White anyway and my car coughed a bit when Roger started it up.

[annew]

Mine have germinated well too, including the 2 seeds I managed to harvest from the NZ form itself, using the commercial clone as pollen donor.
Incidentally, the pot which housed the NZ plant, and 2 plants of the commercial clone were kept in a greenhouse last winter, which got down to -7C. The NZ plant is up and looking fine, but the other 2 were killed.

[Brian Ellis]

2 plants of the commercial clone were kept in a greenhouse last winter, which got down to -7C. The NZ plant is up and looking fine, but the other 2 were killed.

I lost a small one but the oldest is still ok having overwintered in the cold greenhouse