Randall Unless the collection is special value to a garden, there are few assurances. We are often offered collections and have to explain that we will gladly accept many things to resell (it is an important way for a caring gardener to support the Botanical collections) or, if the material has provenance and fit in our collection plan, we would gladly incorporate it. I think that few botanical gardens could accommodate a whole collection except under special circumstances. For example, Lotusland recently acquired a large donated cactus collection and the Huntington is preparing to accept a large cultivated cycad collection (neither of these institutions have strong provenance based collection policies). Smaller gardens might accept a whole collection if interesting, but I doubt its future would be assured. Unfortunately, many of us think our collection is irreplaceable (and it is for us), but more often than not, they end with us. Many people assume a group like Garden Conservancy will take it over, but this sadly the case. Paul Licht, Director Univ. California Botanical Garden 200 Centennial Drive Berkeley, CA 94720 (510)-643-8999 http://botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu/ On 12/24/2011 1:03 PM, Randall P. Linke wrote: > Paul, > > You speak to one of the issues I have puzzled over, what happens to my > collection when I am gone. > > I frankly, from past experience, do not trust any of the smaller botanical > gardens to conserve a collection. My initial thought was an educational > institution, but the cuts to these do not even bode well for their ability > to conserve a collection. If you have any thoughts as to where those of us > interested can place collections for posterity I for one (and my current > collection is much smaller than many here) would like to hear of them. > > Randy >