North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Heron Breen <breen@fedcoseeds.com>]

Hi Tanis,
I have been trying to get "in" with a few places recently to establish 
a "collection" of things I find interesting. My first idea is a high 
school/primary 
school/junior high situation where I try to offer my horticultural interests 
as 
free decoration within a current landscape plan. Of course all plants are 
free as 
well as my advice on how to care for them and place them. Seems a possibility 
in 
schools with an enviromental awareness class or activity. Offering to work 
with 
classes and do demonstrations of whatever horticultural you are interested in 
helps 
too. This approach is better with ornamentals, but I hope fruit tree can fit 
into 
this idea as well. I have had limited success thus far, with one specimen 
planting 
installed at a high school campus in my area. My stipulations are I can have 
access 
to the plantings at anytime for propagation. 
My other idea has been to work with municipal dept or community garden clubs 
to 
distribute plants into public plantings, display gardens, and enthusiastic 
backyards. Willingness to speak at garden club workshops about your hobby and 
demonstrate propagation techniques is needed. I am experiencing some succes 
in 
these areas. Universities a sometimes an option, but I haven't seen that to 
be the 
case at our largest state U. The campus plan keeps changing and there is 
little 
promise that specimen plantings will not fall victim to foot-traffic or the 
axe in 
a few years. The university is considering a campus wide arboretum plan, 
which 
designs for plantings of this type, but they are not there yet.
I think a person must be satisfied with having their discoveries or works in 
more 
than one place. You have to be offering some excellent, unique, and 
well-known 
works for a whole collection in one place to be established. To me, the best 
goal 
is to get the variety or species into commerce. I am working with a nursery 
much 
larger than my own to offer any cool plants I bump into. I get no money out 
of 
this. Of course they will only attempt to sell the ones they think are 
possible 
sellers, but, hey, in a few years those few offerings could be in someone's 
backyard, without them even knowing my name. I actually get joy out of that 
idea of 
anonymous beauty or edibility. The patenting technique is good, but I like 
the idea 
of someone liking the plant so much that they give propagated plants away to 
friends and family as gifts. Even if something losses its ID and just becomes 
a 
family, local, or regional favorite with a generalized name, I think that 
would be 
great! Just as long as it is still kicking. I like people liking things so 
much, 
they don't bother with details. That is when would know I found something 
good. But 
to footnote all this, I really don't know if I have anything good yet!
Not much success thus far, but I have only been working at finding a few 
places for 
2 years,
Heron Breen
zone 4, Maine


On Thu Aug 25 16:17 , 'tanis cuff' <tanistanis@hotmail.com> sent:

>What kind of contingency plans are NAFEXers making for their plantings?  I'm 
>thinking mostly of those explorers who are doing increases on their 
>collections of great selections, and breeders who are making crosses and 
>looking 20 or 30 years ahead.  For example, a plum breeder could lose a year 
>just because of a cold at blossom time.  Examples from the list include a 
>nursery owner who had a temporarily disabling bike accident, & someone who 
>had to move a 10-year-old orchard because of a land-use dispute, and most 
>recently the death of Tom V of "Applesource" (which is a service rather than 
>an orchard, but same principle applies.)
>
>I have a couple nice chance-seedling apples which I hope I'll share with 
>enough people (and how many are "enough"?!) before I quit gardening in 4 or 
>40 years.  But I'd like to learn what the more serious explorers & breeders 
>have planned for preserving/continuing their work.
>
>
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