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Cultivating Discoveries: Plant Collections and Research

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Cultivating Discoveries: Plant Collections and Research CULTIVATING DISCOVERIES: PLANT COLLECTIONS AND RESEARCH ontgomery Botanical Center (MBC) is dedicated to MBC is to upgrade its plant collections, increasing quality and Mcultivating scientific plant collections for research, quantity of plants, documentation, and data. conservation, and education. In this mission, MBC fills a role COMPLEMENTARITY of increasing importance. As botanic gardens expand their roles, Complementarity is how Montgomery Botanical accom- MBC is taking a serious look at the profile of plant collections. plishes botany. The off-site researcher is our crucial partner, THE GARDEN IN HISTORY providing cutting-edge research ability and infrastructure while Gardens have been integral since our beginnings—the MBC provides expertly curated live plant collections, with cultivation of plants defines civilization. One of our first cities, copious associated data. Our plant collections are specifically Babylon, was long revered structured to maximize for its splendid gardens. research utility, being exclu- Although beautiful, ancient sively wild-collected and gardens were also functional. population-based. Egyptian technology used Last year, MBC pro- plants of distant provenance vided material to dozens of which required sophisti- universities. Expert scientists cated horticulture and basic often cannot grow palms research. Carefully tended and cycads in their specific medieval monastic gardens climate, but these research were live apothecaries. By the collections thrive at MBC. Renaissance, the garden was Local plant collections well established for millennia. complement each other. Today, these early roles Other curated plant col- (science and ornamentation) lections are near MBC expand and multiply. The including our colleagues at Research, conservation, and aesthetics intersect at Montgomery Botani- modern garden claims many cal. This dramatic mass planting is also a scientific collection of Cycas The Kampong, Chapman titles: community center, edu- panzhihuaensis, a rare and threatened cycad species from China. Field, Fairchild, and the Gif- cational leader, research lab, ford Arboretum. We often and event venue. But at its heart, plants make the garden—living share material to enhance each other’s efforts. collections are the vital capital that sustains all other functions to Montgomery Botanical’s research includes biogeography, which a garden aspires. taxonomy, phenology, and long-term natural history studies. RESEARCH AND THE GARDEN As those approaches are now rarer in the university, MBC takes Universities are amazing engines of research productivity an active role in conserving them, complementing lab-based via three factors: research infrastructure, economies of scale, research at the colleges. and exclusive access to the best-trained and lowest-cost talent As botany moves forward into the genomics era, scientific pool—students. Universities are the centers of intellectual capital plant collections are even more crucial. As partners with our off- in our society. site colleagues, Montgomery Botanical Center’s role is clear—we Emulating a university is not the best use of MBC’s advance botany through expertly curated live plant material. resources, as our role differs. Whereas universities have immense M. Patrick Griffith, Ph.D., Executive Director intellectual capital, gardens are centers of botanical capital. As Montgomery Botanical Center universities increase research capacity, the adaptive response for [email protected] Montgomery Botanical Center Established 1959 Board of Directors Walter D. Haynes, Esq., President Karl Smiley, M.D., Vice President Charles P. Sacher, Esq., Sec./Treasurer Loyd Kelly, Assistant Secretary Libby Besse Nicholas Kelly Peter Manz Executive Director M. Patrick Griffith, Ph.D. F r o m t h e Botanical Consultants Executive Director John Popenoe, Ph.D. Timothy Gregory, Ph.D. Montgomery Fellows omplementarity is the word at Montgomery Botanical Center. John Dowe, Ph.D. C Colleagueship, collaboration, and cooperation are the keys to success in William Hahn, Ph.D. our botanical endeavors. Briefly defined, complementarity is like a pair of Silvia Salas-Morales shoes—without both working together, neither functions quite as well. To advance science, education, This newsletter focuses on complementarity, partnerships, and common conservation and horticultural interests. Dr. Larry Noblick’s collecting expedition in our home state of knowledge of tropical plants, Florida complements our global palm collections with important local emphasizing palms and cycads, conservation material. Michael Calonje’s expedition to the Atlantic slope Montgomery Botanical Center of Costa Rica complements his previous expedition (and Spring 2006 collects seeds from wild plant Zamia populations around the world and newsletter article) searching for of Costa Rica’s Pacific slope. Ericka grows the resulting plants in Witcher highlights the interplay of cycads and mathematics. Logan Barton, population-based, documented, our inaugural Montgomery Intern, represents the value of MBC’s partnership scientific collections, for use by with the university community. botanists, scientists, and educators, in a 120-acre botanical garden Larry Schokman and our colleagues at The Kampong hosted an exemplifying excellent design. outstanding international conference this past June, which brought numerous participants from across the globe. At that conference, in spite of the global Montgomery Botanical Center horticultural luminaries present, it was abundantly clear how much botanical (originally The Montgomery Foundation) talent we have locally in Miami. It was perhaps the best complement (and is a tax-exempt, nonprofit, private compliment) for us to host these global and local guests here at Montgomery institution established by Nell Botanical for a survey of our collections. Montgomery Jennings in memory of her husband, Colonel We were also pleased to host visits by Dr. Barry Tomlinson’s Tropical Robert H. Montgomery, and Botany courses this summer. With all of Miami’s botanical collections his love of palms and cycads. participating, Barry’s courses exemplify complementarity. Adding another layer of complement, Dr. Paul Cox accompanied this group and obtained Montgomery Botanical News research material from our cycad collections. is published biannually by Montgomery Botanical Center. As we move forward in our botanical mission, it is good to know that our 11901 Old Cutler Road friends and colleagues support and encourage our efforts, just as we cheer Miami, Florida 33156 them on and help them meet their goals. This is a great community to be a (Phone) 305.667.3800 part of. (Fax) 305.661.5984 [email protected] www.montgomerybotanical.org Masthead photo of Veitchia arecina (formerly V. montgomeryana) by Harvey Bernstein, imaging editor. Pictured: Dr. Griffith with one of his favorite collections at Montgomery Botanical Center, Printed on recycled paper Pseudophoenix vinifera. 2 Montgomery Botanical News | Fall 2006 FLORIDA HAS PALMS, TOO! ontgomery Botanical Center tions to those with trunks up (MBC) has wild-collected to several meters in height. populationM samples of palms and cycads Imagine the difficulties the from all over the world, but very few from early pioneers had traversing Florida other than the native popula- the state when saw palmetto tions growing naturally on site. We had blanketed Florida in seemingly been ignoring our own backyard! So, endless and unbroken stands. in November 2005, Harvey Bernstein, Just north of St. Joseph MBC’s imaging specialist, and I embarked Peninsula State Park are some on a Florida palm-collecting trip. of the state’s most beautiful Twelve of the 14 native palm species forests in Florida Caverns and of the continental U.S. occur in Florida. Torreya State Parks. Both are Six are found only in the Florida Keys or Lake Wales Ridge, Sabal etonia in foreground excellent places to appreciate in the Everglades, one is extinct, leaving the rare, silvery, palmate beauty five for the rest of the state. The St. Joseph of the needle palm, Rhapidophyllum hystrix. On its trunk, abundant leaf litter-gathering Peninsula State Park in Florida’s panhan- needles exist with nests of “killer” biting ants. Harvey and I “painfully” collected mature dle is truly spectacular. This narrow, over seed between these needles while fighting off the ants. We developed a technique that was fairly successful, but finding seed was due to sheer luck rather than skill. The needle palm is known to recover from temperatures as low as -15 degrees Fahrenheit, making it one of the most cold-tolerant palms in the world. Two to five million years ago, St. Joseph-like ocean sand dune formations graced a 100-mile chain of ancient islands down the center of Florida now forming the Lake Wales Ridge. While most of the rest of Florida had been submerged at numerous times, the Lake Wales Ridge remains unsubmerged and its ecosystems essentially undis- turbed since the Miocene. These Lake Wales paleoislands are home to Florida’s oldest and rarest plants. Today, more than 300 feet above sea level, those dunes abound with saw palmetto and the scrub palmetto, Sabal etonia. Nestled between the Lake Wales dunes lies a well-developed, moist hammock— Highlands Hammock State Park—with a few dwarf palmettos, rare needle palms, many 80-foot cabbage palms, and 1,000- year-old live oaks. It is absolutely a “must see” ancient forest, a step back in time and Highlands Hammock State Park, Dr. Noblick climbing to examine Sabal palmetto fruit the
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