Deltatango301 Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 (edited) I am pretty certain through out the world you should not take any plants but what about seed ? Edited March 20, 2016 by Deltatango301 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ada Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 some people do collect wild seed and it is for sale now and then. In some cases it is the only way these plants get to survive as their habitat is built on or drained. Also if it leaves the plants in the wild but gets their genetics out there into cultivation,it helps stop poachers taking plants from the wild. Some people will always see it as a money making opportunity but if people want to grow these plants someone has to collect the seeds and this costs money through travel and permits,so any spare seed is sold. so i'm all for responsible collection of wild seed. ada Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nadja77 Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 I used to collect seed from plants I found on my excursions in Swaziland, not to sell but to share out. I think, as long as only a reasonable amount is collected, it helps introduce new locations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marcel van den Broek Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 Laws and regulations vary all over the world, but for me personally it is not so much a case of being allowd or not (though of course you should always follow the laws and regulations that apply). It's a question of ethics and those might be just harder to have than just follow the law. Basically people manage to convince themselves that seed should be taken because a location isn't doing well, the place is burning or flooding or whatever. Most common is of course..there was so many of it I only took X. What the real issues here are: SHOULD YOU COLLECT? For that you have to answer some questions: (again, this is my view, NOT an offical policy of anyone, just something I myself think everyone should consider). SHOULD: Is it legal? Is there really enough seed? collected amounts even for scientific purposes are set very low! Is the habitat really going to go or are fires, floodings etc natural processes? YOU Am I a good enough grower that I will get a high yield? No? Leave it to somebody else! Are you good enough at methods and keeping records that your collection will have a scientific value? No? Especially with rare species.. keep your paws of it! Do I want the plant for myself or to make money? Let it be, not ethical. Is it my intention to make the species more available to growers? Possibly ethical, check the other points. COLLECT Is the plant not available in cultivation already..or is it just to expensive/I myself have to wait too long? If not available...report the location to a scientist and see what can be done otherwise...leave it! Correct collections have permissions and paperwork that show who took what from where. Is it a possible new species? Take lots of pictures and register the location but don't touch...go to the nearest Univeristy or botanical garden and report your possible find. They will know how to do it right. This is of course not a complete list...but I hope it will give people something to think about. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
linuxman Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 What we (IMHO) is someone to officially collect the seed in a controlled manner and then sell on to benefit possible conservation efforts. All the time there's no official route to get new variants of plants people are going to illegally/irresponsibly take the matter into their own hands. If for instance Meadowview sold wild collected seed I wouldn't mind paying for it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nadja77 Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 I am not being argumentative but does this mean I was in the wrong to collect these seeds? When I was a newbie and full of enthusiasm to contribute back in the day, I asked if it is permissible to collect wild seed, and opinions differred from todays views. I have always tried to do everything in line with laws and regulations and my interest was not to ever profit from any collected seed but to bring it into cultivation. Maybe this is/was a wrong stance to take.Our little country had a group of people 'researching' and contributing in their respective fields of 'expertise' some vastly more qualified than others. Kate Braun who ran and maintained our one and only plant data base: http://www.sntc.org.sz/flora/botanical.asp was a volunteer herself and I believe she extended invitations to botanists from SA to visit certain locations but never was successful (for CPs that is) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marcel van den Broek Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 Nadja (and all): views change over the years and we must never forget that at some point all plants got taken from the wild. However, these days many species are highly endangered and what is even more worrying: collections are more and more not done to bring material into cultivation or to do research, etc but to make a profit or because people don't want to pay the price for a perfectly healthy cultivated specimen. If someone follows the laws and regulations that apply to the specific country and location than there is technically no problem with a responsible, small, collection. What I try to add to the discussion is the question of the need to collect even if you are allowed too... New species should be collected professionally because a) we don't know how rare it is yet and b) because many private collectors screw things up..the administration is off, they press the herbarium specimens wrong so they can't be used, etc. Species that are known and are in cultivation can be bought from reliable sources and offspring gets shared. New locations etc certainly have a value as they enrich the genetic basis of the secies in cultivation and could be collected within the rules as they apply... I just try to encourage people to think about the points of ethics I made. Taking your own example...you said you followed the rules to the best of your knowledge..so that is fine You didn't do it to get rich and you spread the material around There was no/hardly any material from Swaziland in cultivation so the material was genetically valuable It didn't involve new species. Nobody else was doing it or intending to do it. That sounds pretty ethical to me...but there are too many people who won't even bother thinking about it.... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nadja77 Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 You try the best you can to educate people. There is not much you can do about those that don't want to be educated. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.