Nice/clever rant. Not even sure of the legality of patenting plants. Can you patent dog breeds? Cats? Horses? Cows? Chickens?

Wow, "STFUBIATCH" is getting pretty serious, lol

I have noticed quite a few cultivars coming out that have similar if not the same characteristics of previous cultivars. Physocarpus and Hydrangea paniculata being two you can pick on. Conifers are know for this as well but it not nearly as ridiculous as far as marketing, naming and patents.

On a side note I still don't understand how monrovia is still in business. Every year without fail they have the worst stock in those tall narrow pots with a horrible media that seems to encourage dense root encircling.

and for a shiny penny.. you will tell how us how you really feel .... lol ..

really like that JM name ...

ken

Once cloning becomes commonplace, maybe patent the wife and kids.

"Wow, "STFUBIATCH" is getting pretty serious, lol"

Of course, I was lampooning the ridiculous names they do come up with, which are supposed to be as unappealing as possible! What nursery would list that plant? When they don't have the legal right to use the gushing marketing name? The point of that nonsense is to find a way to defacto extend the patent beyond 17 years. (and apparently hort. patents are already a little longer)

I found Monrovia's new plants 2010 listing in internet archive. Only about 40% back then were patented. So clearly this is the direction the new set of bean counters wants to take things. They don't care about improving horticulture as a whole of course, they just think this is the way to maximize profits in the dwindling market for plants-other-than-annuals-and-vegetable-starts.

I can to some degree accept that plant patents have a place, I've never said I was completely against them. I just don't like the fact that some marketing weenies apparently think it's the best approach for all new plants on the market, even a rare Chinese BLE (Polyspora) that almost certainly didn't undergo any extensive kind of testing/evaluation. If they trialed 300 Polyspora in a cold field in southern Ohio and that was the one that survive a few winters...maybe...but we know that's not the case.

I've been introducing a new rambling rose to the market this year. It certainly isn't patented, but I respectfully ask my customers not to propagate for the purpose of selling them. I don't mind if they propagate for themselves. I do think the patent thing is getting out of hand though. Even here, on GW, if you talk about propagating a patented plant (even if you didn't know it was patented) everyone goes nuts and attacks you. In other words, I'm fine with patented plants, but the laws should be a bit less strict. For example:

A few weeks ago when I trimmed my Knock Out rose, I may have propagated A cutting for myself to grow and enjoy. That does not mean I would have mass-propagated them for myself, or to sale.

With every plant being patented, and them asking outrageous prices for them, the market is bound to decline. If I go to lowes, I will spend $10-$15 on a 1-gallon (or smaller) sized shrub. Not everyone has money to spend on patented plants, and they cannot legally propagate them, even if they've had one for years, and maybe just want a few more. This also makes it hard for people like me to propagate, grow, and sell plants. My selection would be much better than it is now, if only I could propagate lots of patented plants without the patent holder asking for ridiculously high royalty fees.

Monrovia...I don't get it either.

Two falls ago, a local "orange" big box store (you know the one) has several Aesculus "Autumn Splendor" from Monrovia for sale.

Easily 2.5" caliper...in what appeared to be maybe a 7-gallon pot. I don't even want to think about how horribly rootbound those poor things probably were.

I bought some variegated boxwood (monrovia). They were so root bound that I couldn't see the soil. They underwent extensive root pruning.

There are so many issues here...the growers won't grow what the public won't pay for. Makes me nuts that every woody plant that I buy is 2" too deep in the pot. Add to that the fact that young trees have not been pruned properly so I'm fighting a rearguard battle once I get them in. And the growers will tell you that they are barely making it as it is. I do woody plant workshops here; we have maybe a dozen people and I get the nurseries to donate poorly planted stock. We then do a demo on one and then everyone has to 'attack' their specimen and figure out how to repot it. It's mind-boggling how bad many of these individuals are (the plants not the people). Until the public will pay up, it's hard to blame the growers.

Brandon, there are some out there, but typically they are hard to find, and many struggle financially.

Well, it's a capitalist society, as my father would say. Sad to say, this is the system. I learned I learned that a few years ago, when there was a health product available that was beneficial (at least to me and many whom I knew) but it was a natural product which could not be patented. It was absorbed by big pharmaceutical company (which wanted the brand recognition) and then slowly changed to the completely different and not as effective product which could be patented, That didn't work - nobody brought the product because it was the same garbage available under many various names. Eventually, everyone lost because they just killed the brand and it is nowhere to be found. STFUBIATCH, indeed.

Well, all I can say is I guess that business model is working for them and they figure they can protect their interests way into the future.

" they figure they can protect their interests way into the future."

Depends how you define future. Right now, apparently, Monrovia is more interested in paying lawyers than paying people to take care of their nursery stock. (I didn't even bring up the quality issue, but everyone else did and I knew it was out there.) Horticulture won't have much of a future if 50% of the container grown plants people buy die a few years down the road from knotted roots, and the masses just decide growing plants is 'too complicated'. I think we are already in the midst of that, actually.

Sara your project to help people deal with badly grown container stock seems very commendable, as I've come to the conclusion most of it is badly grown!

"Well, it's a capitalist society, as my father would say. Sad to say, this is the system." But as I pointed out, it wasn't always this way. When did plant patents start? late 1960s? Before that there was a thriving wholesale and retail nursery trade. There have always been a smattering of patented plants but we are clearly seeing a push in the last few years where at least a few big wholesalers think they should "protect" as many of their offerings as possible. I'm proposing that we, the consumers, are getting the short end of the stick.

And now as the icing on the cake we have the Nagoya protocols, cited by the Coxes as one of the reasons they didn't think mail order plant sales would be profitable anymore in the world's leading market for collectible plants. Kind of the anti-capitalist version of plant patents!

Most woody material I've encountered at outlets here - or have been sent in the mail - has had significant root problems. The exception has been that which was offered bare-rooted, or was received by the retailer bare-rooted, recently potted by them. (Funny how the main peculiar feature of such material is that the root systems are in full view when received by the end consumer or retailer, or presented to the end consumer - when they pull them out of the sawdust. And not hidden inside a pot or burlapped ball).

Meanwhile we've all been living through a We Only Want Color Spots and Edible Plants phase for some years now. One where sales of woody ornamentals fell off markedly anyway - supposedly Monrovia almost went under recently. With everyone in apartments, condos, townhouse-style single family houses with significantly minimized yard space* or rental houses there is no market for huge quantities of decorative trees and shrubs of normal size and vigor.

*Even the one that looks like a Hollywood mansion that went at the far back of a double lot along a nearly at-the-beach view street just north of the small downtown here has mostly parking and a turn around for a front yard. Other expensive looking new houses being built in place of the old bungalows or ramblers that have made up this same neighborhood for a long time also more or less fill the lots with architecture.

In keeping with this another big boy going in up on the ridge some ways back from the water looks like an L-shaped mini-mall. Yet is situated where it is definitely somebody's private dream home - almost all there will be when it is done is house, garage and vehicle access, with in now characteristic fashion the garden space being limited entirely to narrow strips between the buildings (theirs as well as those of the neighbors) and the paved areas.

The root system issue is one reason I prefer to grow woodies from seed (unless I want a specific cultivar).

While there is something an epidemic of thread bumping going on...I'm going to bump this and quasi-bump my prior thread on the subject: https://www.houzz.com/discussions/1615403/are-patented-plants-ruining-horticulture

to say that I am more convinced than ever this is just another disaster befalling American horticulture, like the epidemic of knotted root container stock. Last spring I bought a patented and name-trademarked Sedum at an upscale regional nursery. Absolutely amazing looking. Wasn't what I came in for but caught my eye. Sedums are not my favorite but I have plenty of experience with them. When I started gardening in the late 80s 'Autumn Joy' was all the rage and was in several of the gardens I took care of. Including my own, that I 'inherited' so to speak, from my parents, and I couple gardens where I worked as a gardener. Of course it is absolutely indestructible. I don't have one in my current garden but I have had 'Vera Jamison' almost as long as I've owned this garden - one of the first perennials I planted - and it too is quite indestructible. And a few others. I've never encountered a Sedum that didn't grow well, and in fact Sedum 'Angelina' is one of the few plants of the hundreds I've grown to be purposely deaccessioned from the garden. For being too wild and spreading!

This new super cool looking Sedum? Planted with all the care I plant my other perennials - that usually survive. It was dead by the end of summer. No idea why. It was in a full sun spot, well drained soil, where it should have done superbly. Clearly they are not selecting and patenting plants based on their strong constitutions, because this is part of a pattern I've seen with patented perennials, especially.

hi davidrt28, check out my POST on the succulents forum. Plants have never been a problem with the source I give. I think sometimes sedums can be a little tricky to get started.

Funny you mention, Autumn sedum is the longest-lived of any perennial or small shrub I've planted since 2005. Still going strong.

similar experience... i'm not a sedum person.. but have my share of Autumn sedums that have been going strong for 15 years... but the few random "interesting" varieties that have caught my eye rarely make it through a winter or two next to the autumn type.

Yep nevermore44...there are tender sedum species out there like one of the ones Sam posted about on the other thread (only hardy to zone 7 anyhow) BUT...my point was this sucker died IN THE SUMMER! in a spot where any sedum should have done fine. It's almost like these plants are designed to look really cool on the "store shelf" and not last in your garden.

Note that Autumn Joy is a translation into English of the German cultivar name 'Herbstfreude' . In other words there is no cultivar 'Autumn Joy'.

And sam...I've grown plenty of difficult to please succulents...this seemed like a matter of either bred to be difficult to please, or rushed into production by over-fertilizing it, creating a huge plant with a tiny root system, or a combination of both. Point is it's really unacceptable for a plant from a genus as tough as sedum to be dying after correct planting but we see many, many reports of the same thing with the various bizarre looking Echinaceas bred over the past couple decades. Plain old Echinacea purpurea is indestructible.

Thanks for the clarification Embo. That plant was originally popularized by "Oehme and Van Sweden" IIRC. Like various European named plants, its name was translated for American commerce.