Kudzu revisted (off topic) Re: Today is your last chance to comment on new US plantimportregulations
Ellen Hornig (Wed, 21 Oct 2009 13:30:26 PDT)

Recently I reread David Fairchild's _The World Was My Garden_ (the truly
magical autobiography of one of the great masterminds of US plant
introduction), and was amazed to find that he grew kudzu on his own property
and then struggled to get rid of it *before* the Soil Conservation Service
started planting it widely to control erosion (Fairchild, p. 328). This
suggests two things to me: first, a private individual (collector) could in
fact be responsible for introducing a pest (Fairchild, realizing his
mistake, paid "over two hundred dollars", somewhere between 1900-1905, I
believe, to get rid of it, but not everyone would make a comparable
investment); second, information does not always travel far and widely
enough, because Fairchild was apparently not aware of the Soil Conservation
Service's efforts until he saw them written up in a bulletin. There is
nothing in his book to suggest he tried to interfere or get them to
backtrack.

I toss this in only because, self-interest aside, the importation and
cultivation of new species is NOT always harmless, private growers CAN get
their hands on and circulate a new pest, and I am therefore a fencesitter on
the subject of regulation, because I honestly don't know what is the best
(or even a good and effective) approach.

Ellen

Ellen Hornig
Seneca Hill Perennials
3712 County Route 57
Oswego NY 13126 USA
http://www.senecahillperennials.com/
----- Original Message -----
From: "Adam Fikso" <adam14113@ameritech.net>
To: "Pacific Bulb Society" <pbs@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Wednesday, October 21, 2009 3:58 PM
Subject: Re: [pbs] Today is your last chance to comment on new US
plantimportregulations