growing heritage | garden plants & conservation Action plan for conservation of plants in cultivation 1 Guide to terms and abbreviations ABS Access to Genetic Resources & Benefit Sharing. Herbarium Place of deposition of permanently preserved plant material for reference in naming plants and for AGM RHS Award of Garden Merit. research. BG-BASE is a database application designed to manage HTA The Horticultural Trades Association. information on biological (primarily botanical) collections. It is used by a wide variety of botanic gardens, arboreta, Hyperdiverse A group of plants (or any organisms) that show herbaria, zoos, universities etc. including the RHS. an unusually high level of speciation or differentiation into taxa. BGCI Botanic Gardens Conservation International. ICRA International Cultivar Registration Authority. BGEN Botanic Gardens Education Network. International Cultivar Register A list, as near complete as CBD Convention on Biological Diversity (1992: entered into possible, of all the named cultivars of a particular group of force 29th December 1993). plants with at least the date of introduction or CITES Convention on International Trade in Endangered registration and the registrant, where known. The Register Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (1973). is the responsibility of an ICRA (q.v.). Clone A plant that is perpetuated solely by vegetative In situ [Of plant material] grown in the natural habitat within propagation so that all individuals are genetically identical. the country of origin. COTES Control of Trade in Endangered Species. IPEN International Plant Exchange Network. Cryopreservation Storage of plant genetic material in liquid IPR Intellectual Property Rights. nitrogen means it can be kept for decades without MTA Material Transfer Agreement. regrowing the plant. NCCPG The National Council for the Conservation of Plants Cryptic hybrid A hybrid sharing many of the morphological and Gardens. features of one parent, so that it is not readily recognised visually and often only detected using biochemical or Nomenclatural Standard A permanently preserved molecular methods. specimen or illustration, photograph or image, to which the name of a cultivar is attached and serves as an Cultivar A plant with one or more stable and distinctive authoritative reference to interpret that name. features or characteristics that has arisen in cultivation or has been selected from wild material and differs from the NT The National Trust. type. PBR Plant Breeders’ Rights. DEFRA UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural PIC Prior Informed Consent. Affairs. Portal An internet site that acts as an entrance to related Demeter software for recording plants in gardens developed websites so that a search for information can be carried by the NCCPG to help its National Plant Collection out without having to visit each of the websites holders to document information about their National separately. Plant Collections. RBGE Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. Ex situ [Of plant material] grown or held somewhere other than the natural habitat within the country of origin. RBGK Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Genotype Part of the range of variation of a species or a Red Data Book A list of wild plants for a particular region or natural population characterised by a distinct and unique taxonomic group whose continued existence is genetic pattern. considered to be threatened, usually with an assessment of the degree of threat. Grex A group of hybrid cultivars, defined solely by parentage. Grex parents may be species or another grex. The term is RHS The Royal Horticultural Society. only now used for orchids. The plural is greges, but more SSSI Site of Special Scientific Interest. usually in horticulture, grexes. Taxon A unit of classification (genus, species, variety &c.); GSPC Global Strategy for Plant Conservation. plural, taxa. Cosmos Preface atrosanguineus RHS Herbarium In 1978 the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) held a conference on the Practical Role of Gardens in the Conservation of Rare and Threatened Plants. Out of that conference was born the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens (NCCPG), an organisation that has gone from strength to strength in the succeeding years. The work of the NCCPG, so much of which depends on the willing contributions of volunteers, has shown how much can be achieved and, indeed, the model has been adopted by other countries. The NCCPG and the RHS felt that it was an opportune moment to review these achievements and to set the agenda for the medium term. In April 2006, the two organisations held the Growing Heritage Conference, and in the course of which this Action Plan was agreed. However, in a world with ever increasing demands on people’s time and money, it William Thompson, the founder of could be asked why we should put resources into conserving ornamental Thompson and Morgan Seed Merchants, cultivated plants when there are so many other deserving causes. Moreover, is it first brought this tuberous rooted half- so critical to maintain plants, some of which have been surpassed by more recent hardy perennial to Britain in 1835. breeding and selection or lack the qualities that would make them first class Although it received an Award of plants for gardens today? The answer can be summed up in the word “Heritage”: Garden Merit from the RHS in 1938, and without such conservation efforts, accurate replanting of old gardens would not despite velvet maroon flowers with the be possible; nor could we go back to older genotypes to recover attributes – such distinctive chocolate perfume it as scent, disease resistance or a particular colour – that have been lost in disappeared from gardens. Living stock subsequent breeding programmes. And tastes in plants do change, as do fashions had been preserved at the Royal Botanic in gardening styles, often associated with an upsurge in interest in gardens and Gardens, Kew since the 1970s and during garden plants of the past. Heritage also means the wealth of cultural and historical the 1990s material was micropropagated connections that plants have with particular regions or communities that need to and cryogenically preserved. Until be recorded before they are lost. Finally, we must not overlook the need to recently Cosmos atrosanguineus was maintain a diversity of garden plants adapted to our climate and conditions, or to thought to be extinct in the wild and new conditions in a period of climate change, in the face of increasing uniformity Kew’s material was repatriated to Mexico found in plant centre “chain stores”. Each of these aspects contributes in a real to attempt reintroduction. However, the way to improving the quality of life for the ordinary gardener. present gene pool in cultivation only derives from one or two introductions The international and national context for plant conservation has changed and as cross-pollination is required to dramatically since the coming into force of the Convention on Biological Diversity produce viable seeds it was not certain (CBD) in 1993 and the tightening of regulations on the trade in endangered species whether the reintroduction programme (CITES). A failure to recognise this and respond constructively will lead to stricter would be successful. control of the movement of plant material as countries seek, quite understandably, to protect their resources and to gain benefits from them should those plants be All is not lost, though, since from New found to have a wider value. But gardeners, nurserymen and plant enthusiasts Zealand has come the first instance of a cannot easily call on the machinery of state to provide the support they need to self-fertile clone, registered for Plant continue the valuable flow of new plants into our gardens. Any solutions to Breeders Rights in New Zealand as ‘Pinot responsible and sustainable plant introduction must allow for this and provide the Noir’. Plants have also more recently means for all involved to meet these goals. Further, gardeners and horticulturists been rediscovered in the wild. have a vital role to play in the ex situ conservation of plants from around the world by growing and researching them. Not to put too fine a point on it: Cosmos is easily propagated by basal everyone from the large institutions to the individual gardener will benefit if the stem cuttings or dividing the tubers “good practices” that need to be encouraged and more widely adopted are and is now a very popular garden plant, achievable and supported by the horticultural community as a whole. currently listed in the RHS Plant Finder by 59 nurseries. This Action Plan sets out the factors that affect cultivated ornamental plant conservation, which are in many respects the same as those that affect plant conservation as a whole. The future of cultivated plant conservation depends Cosmos atrosanguineus, from a painting by upon all of us, through partnerships and collaboration, and cannot be carried Dorothy B Martin in 1938, part of the out by one organisation alone. painting collection of the RHS Herbarium 3 Contents OBJECTIVE 1 OBJECTIVE 2 Knowledge Education OBJECTIVE 1 Make information about our Make people more aware of Knowledge 6 plants more accessible ... the importance of cultivated plants ... E Hagart-Alexander RHS Herbarium OBJECTIVE 2 Education 8 OBJECTIVE 3 Strategy 11 OBJECTIVE 4 Enhancing diversity 13 The rapid growth and increased There is no doubt that the general level sophistication of technology over the of awareness about the need to protect OBJECTIVE 5 past 20 years makes it possible to gather and conserve the world’s animals and Best practice 16 and connect information about garden plants has increased as the threat to the plants that was inconceivable in the planet due to the loss of biodiversity is past. We have the means now to spread better appreciated. Cultivated plants that knowledge and make it available to can become extinct too: sometimes wider and different audiences. The UK because better plants are developed has one of the most diverse garden but also because certain kinds of plants floras in the world: it is vital that we do go through phases of being more to document and record it before unfashionable.