Specific Families and Genera > Pleione and Orchidaceae

GREX names

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ptallbo:
Hello!

Any grower of Cypripedium and other orchids here?

Just did see a post form M Weinart about a seedling they named Cypripedium Henric , since this it an orchid it seem ok to sell all the seedlings under that name even if some might be in different colour and shape,size or whatever as long as it is a GREX raised from seed. I asked him how it came that it not needed to be divided in divisions to be ok to use that name, that you can not name a bunch of seedlings Henric that have so many different shapes. But he reffered to GREX. So is it someone here that also grow these species from seeds that can explain this in a better way and why should orchids not follow the common rules about naming and selling cutlivars.

Peter Tallbo
Why give seedlings a cultivar name? This will in the future make huge problems when all these plants are spread around and labels lost and different colours, shape and so on, of them occur. To give a plant a cultivar name it need to be a specific plant and only allowed to use that name on divisions??

Michael Weinert
Hi Peter, For orchid hybrids it is different. It is not a cultivar name, it is a grex name. Grexes are hybrid seedlings of similar appearance. I know about the difficulties, but nomenclature is hardly worth discussing. It is always making a round thing square and trying to put complexity of nature into rules.
The grex names are registered at the RHS.

Maggi Young:
Naming of plants is less a science, more  a "dark art" - in the  opinion of a great many people!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grex_(horticulture)

Tim Harberd:
Hi Peter,
   It takes a long time to get orchid seedlings to flower.

   If a breeder has made a promising new cross, they might have a lot of seedlings, but only have the capacity to raise a proportion of them to flowering.

   Once a breeder has chosen the best of the crop, it will take years to multiply up the best plant, and market it. So the eventual buyers will have to wait longer and pay more.

   SO: Breeders may offer un-flowered seedlings. The breeder gets some early return on their efforts and the buyer gets a lottery ticket.

   OR: The breeder may offer flowered seedlings, which are almost as good as the best seedling, but a fraction of the cost.

   In both of these scenarios, the breeder is selling ‘spares’. Names are reserved for the special ones.

   IF you know the grex of a seedling you can make an educated guess as to whether you are likely to be interested in the progeny.


   In the case you site, Cyprepedium Henric, it is a primary hybrid (between two species).So in this instance you are sort of dealing with an F1. Therefor I wouldn’t expect a lot of variability. If you like it, buy one now and don't wait ten years for someone to release C. Henric 'The Special One'.

Hope that’s helpful


Tim DH

Anders:
Hi Peter

I think this is how it works. If you know the registered grex name, you can always trace the parentage. Pleione Jorullo gx is the grex P. limprichtii x P. bulbocodioides. A grex can also be between a species and a hybrid or between two hybrids. The grex name should in principle be followed by gx. Specific clones of a grex can have a cultivar name so the cultivars Locking Stumps and Long Tailed Tit are Pleione Jorullo gx 'Locking Stumps' and Pleione Jorullo gx 'Long Tailed Tit'. 

Anders

PS Last year I bought a Cypripedium Henric (not from Weinert), it turned out to be Cypripedium henryi  :-)

ptallbo:
Thank you for answers. I am not new into this with growing plants and how things work. :)

As soon you name something with a specifix name, in this case Henric, then you have made the template for that plant. These are the rules, if you buy a tomato, appletree, what ever that has a specific name it follows the rules from that first plant. And thats the reason so many plants today have a "Trademark" that do not allow you to grow them on your self and sell them without paying the ones the owning the trademark. In this case with the grex you have to name the plant Henric gx  to follow the naming standard of grex,  , in this case the rules are not followed. Just as Anders is writing. This means that the normal buyer do not care about which species/hybrids or whatever are involved in making this named plant, they buy a Henric. When I next time visit my friends garden that has one Henric too but it is light pink, then Ill tell him thats not a Henric it is much darker. If then the gx are included in the name, then it is obvious what it is and explains why they are different. It is also a way to cheat on buyers that think they buy a plant that look specific and it will be easy to by new ones.

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