On 24 Jul 2009, at 15:27, Tony Avent wrote: > You point out the absurdity of such a regulation. If this was in place, > we would not have thousands of plants that we enjoy today from impatiens > to lantana. The best models miss 40% of the plants. Any intelligent > scientist will tell you that it is impossible to predict invasiveness > for each habitat within each ecological region. I had a meeting a > couple of years ago with one of the scientists developing this and we > had this same discussion. Off the record, he admitted that it couldn't > work, but he said that his superiors were demanding it, based on the > rants from radical groups such as the Nature Conservancy, who has taken > an ethnic cleansing stand on this issue. Everyone needs to call USDA > Aphis and their legislatures before it is too late. Sounds to me that the whole regulation can be challenged because has no scientific basis for the classification. Thus it becomes an arbitrary regulation, a category in bad odor these days. As for "plants in cultivation", it should be pointed out that all plants listed in Bailey's "Manual of Cultivated Plants", the various editions of Hortus, and held in the Bailey Hortorium's index of nursery catalogues (which though possibly no longer maintained, has historical interest) should be included automatically. One could argue that any plant listed in any major seed exchange - SRGC, AGS, NARGS - should also be viewed as "in cultivation." Likewise there are such books as Rehder's "Handbook of Woody Plants" (I've garbled the title) and Bailey's "Cultivated Conifers" that should automatically be included, as well as all current nursery & seed catalogues. I also suggest that rather than resign from the Nature Conservancy, more people should join and work to reverse its position - a position which is probably due to a few monomaniacs infiltrating the upper echelons of the organization. -- Rodger Whitlock Victoria, British Columbia, Canada Maritime Zone 8, a cool Mediterranean climate on beautiful Vancouver Island http://maps.google.ca/maps/…