Perhaps a note or two regarding patented plants may help. My comments come
from my experience with publishing, and copyright info in both USA and
Canada ... copyright is slightly different yet using the same underlying
principles as a patent.
"Resale" and "propagation" and "commercial" all refer to for-profit
business. Non-profit organizations can offer books, plants, seed, etc., for
sale without crossing copyright -- and as far as I've found out -- patent
regulations. Plant patents are also legally suspect. You cannot patent a
recipe or technique and the horrible Monsanto cases against the grain
farmers aside, some feel the change in the plant is more like a recipe
shift than something new or unique (the DNA is not fundamentally changed),
and natural self-sowing or seed drift from natural sources are outside the
purview of an intent to retail a product. That said, plants can at present
be patented.

So, I'd go ahead and have that plant sale and seed swap. And remember,
though we are not a group of veggies farmers, when it comes to Big Hort:
"Control my food, control my politics, control distribution, control my
politics." Just my old-hippie-somewhat-anarchistic opinion.
Jo Canning
Vancouver Island, Canada

-----Original Message-----
From: pbs <pbs-bounces@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net> On Behalf Of Jan
Jeddeloh
Sent: Wednesday, June 20, 2018 4:10 PM
To: Pacific Bulb Society <pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net>
Subject: Re: [pbs] Question regarding commercial advertising

While we’re griping about Big Horticulture I’d like to add my gripe about
patented plants. I’ve been stung too often by patented pretty faces and
have learned that a patent does not necessarily reflect the value or
grow-ability of the plant, although it seems like it ought to. Too often
big nurseries patent every tiny variation and rush the plant to market.
Sometimes it appears they apply for a patent just to lock up the market for
a year or two and then stop producing the plant once the word gets out that
it’s not a good doer. You go to the nursery, are smitten with the pretty
face, bring home your new plant whereupon it promptly dies. I’ve had this
experience several times. And don’t get me started on the million
heucheras or coneflowers out there. They are sold as perennials but most
have an annual life in your normal, less than perfect home garden. You
know, the home garden that does not have the mythical well drained, evenly
moist soil.

Patented plant are also becoming a problem for plant society plant sales.
I organize our NARGS chapter participation in the Hortlandia sale and we
have to watch that we don’t offer patented plants. As more and more plants
are patented it will become harder to find plants we can propagate. Yes
growing from seed it great but many of our members want to donate divisions
and cutting grown plants. Plant tags get lost and it would be very easy to
inadvertently offer a patented plant for sale.

I realize plant breeders want to get some kind of return from their
investment of time and money but it shouldn’t be too much to ask that the
plants be good doers and truly unique. They should also be adequately
trailed. One or two years is just not enough. I have found a couple of
patented plants that are worth growing. Geranium “Roxanne” blooms all
summer, does not spit seed all over and is tough. Salvia “Amistad”, while
tender, puts on a great summer show and is much beloved by bees and
hummingbirds. It also seems rather silly to patent plants that will self
propagated. If it’s going to form a big clump you can easily hack apart
gardeners are going to share it around. This takes no real skill. If you
want to patent a plant it ought to require a bit of skill to propagate or
you will lose the battle of controlling its propagation.

To bring this back around to bulbs does anyone know of any patented
bulbs? I know Terra Nova at one point had applied for a patent on a
Cyclamen coum selection with a Christmas tree marking on the leaves. I
wonder if this was denied because it wouldn’t be hard to find look a likes
in many groups of coum seedlings. It’s not in their current catalog.

Jan Jeddeloh

wrote:

fortunate to live in Clackamas County, Oregon, which has more nurseries
than any other US county, so "local" can mean anything from a daphne at the
farmers' market to a viburnum from the big Monrovia fields on the other
side of the river. I buy some unusual cultivars and rooted cuttings for
cutflowers by mail order, mostly from specialty nurseries. Most years I
obtain some commercial bulbs for planting out in front of the house --
daffodils to distract the bulb fly from the good ones in back, anemones and
crocuses for the bulb lawn, etc. Almost all of my bulb "collection" has
been grown from seed.

nurseries, but small ones do so as well, especially in exaggerating
cold-hardiness. They may not mean to, but if you're growing plants on an
island you don't have the same conditions as most of your customers who
live 150 km or more inland. Conversely, nurseries in colder areas who keep
all their stock in greenhouses may produce plants that are hard to
acclimate to outdoor conditions anywhere. Growing your own from seed is
likely to result in losses, but the survivors will be easier to keep, and
much cheaper.

had been bulked up by keeping two cuttings in one pot, but I got it at the
farmers' market and the grower told me about it. It's a hybrid daphne; I
was able to disentangle the root systems, potted them separately for a
couple of months before planting out, and now have two very fine shrubs.
This spring I went on a spending spree on Dianthus cultivars. One nursery
sent me excellent plants, but another's plants had been in their pots far
too long (I repotted them and waited until they recovered to plant them
out). I almost never put a purchased plant into the garden the day after I
get it. For one thing, you have to watch them for disease.

natural habitats, and structure of the particular species and genera. Bulbs
with strong tunics, such as tulips, can stand dry storage much better than
those without tunics, such as most Fritillaria. A species native to rocky
desert will survive storage better than one native to river meadows. A
species native to the alpine zone may not flourish without a long winter
dormancy (hence the plants "hardy in Denver" that can't be grown in lowland
gardens). It is also instructive to learn how commercial bulbs are grown
and processed in the Netherlands, where they can be grown in sand, heavily
fertilized, protected from predators, lifted and kept in warehouses
controlled for temperature and humidity, and exported in advantageous
condition. After a month at Home Depot and transfer to a home garden,
they'll likely perform for a year but that may be the limit of their
adaptability. Moreover, controlled conditions can suppress the activity of
viruses, which may resurface in the home garden; that's why all my tulips
are grown from seed, and I buy lily bulbs only from The Lily Garden, which
I trust to provide clean stock.

identify an experienced gardener by their possession of a big bag of
plantless labels.

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