South African Adventures, Part III

Today, I am writing you from one of the most beautiful gardens in the World. I’m sitting in the conservatory at Longwood Gardens, attending the Independent Plant Breeder’s Conference. This week, I’m going to tell you all about my last two days in South Africa and then we’ll go into why I’m here learning about plant breeding.

My family had a great start to the week because my husband was born in San Francisco and he’s a huge Giants fan, so as you can imagine, he had a great week because they won the World Series in baseball. Not since 1956 have the Giants come this far. We spent many a nail biting, late night watching the playoffs and then the World Series where they beat the Texas Rangers in 5 games to win it all.

Go Giants!

I last left you wondering if I would encounter a baboon or any other wild beasts, as we traveled from the Western side of the Cape to the middle of the tip that connects to the Indian Ocean in South Africa.

As I said last week, we were a bit late arriving at our bed and breakfast near the tissue culture lab. You might remember we were late because I couldn’t tear myself away from the succulents at the Soekershof Garden.

On the way, we saw an ostrich farm. It was so cool. Did you know you can stand on an ostrich egg and not break it? Can you guess how many regular chicken eggs equal one ostrich egg?

Drum roll…it’s two dozen. Yep, you read that right, two dozen, as in 24 regular eggs.

That’s some omelet!

Ostrich eggs are so thick that they carve them and make the most wonderful lamps. I should have brought one home, but I was really afraid it would break in transit.

We stopped the car to see the herd along the side of the road. As I got closer to the fence, one spotted me and seemed to find my presence quite interesting. It came to the fence, then more came and then I looked up and the rest of the herd was running down the hill toward the fence. It was a bit of a stampede. I was happy to have the fence separating me and the very large, stampeding herd.

They are tall and they have beady little eyes. They stared at me for a while as I took pictures. Maybe it was the flash on the camera, but they sure were fascinated.

After the rolling hills of the ostrich farm, we drove for about an hour to get to the lab. We drove through forested areas, full of pines. It reminded me of Oregon. We also drove through wheat and oat fields for miles and miles. It’s so interesting to go from just about desert conditions to a forest to fields of grain in just a few miles.

We finally reached the lab with about 20 minutes to spare before dinner. We changed into some warmer clothes because it was quite cold and headed off to dinner.

The next day, we would tour the lab.

Tuesday came and we spent the entire morning touring the lab with the owners. I’ve been to tissue culture labs before, but if you haven’t been, it’s a bit hospital like and sterile. In order to enter the lab, you must cover your shoes with booties, wear a net shower cap-like chapeau and don a white lab coat.

In tissue culture, they take a piece of a plant, put it into what looks like a strep throat culture and they grow many more plants. In the culture dish, there is agar with a growing medium that encourages the cells to divide, so you can make many more plants than you could with traditional propagation methods like taking cuttings or dividing the plants.

So, since the environment they work in needs to be sterile, you must also be germ free when entering the lab. There’s big sticky tape on the floor that you walk on to get any dirt and germs off of your shoes- before you put the booties on, and don your white lab coat. Here’s a picture of me in my lab coat, slippers and shower cap, as promised…on film.

How embarrassing.

We learned how hard it is to initiate each crop and saw what goes into that research. You have to be a bit tenacious to tackle a tough plant and these guys are nothing less than tenacious.

I like that! They won’t give up until they get the perfect recipe.

Here’s a picture of all of the tubs of cultures in the lab. There could be millions of plants in this tiny space. That’s the beauty of it.

It was also great for me to see the workers, see where they live and learn about how they are being paid a much higher wage than any comparable position in the area. The lab is good for the town’s economy and they even got a special incentive for the land because they would create jobs. We have programs like this in the US, but it was good, nonetheless, to see it for myself in South Africa.

The workers are actually being paid a living wage and they are appreciated and valued by the owners of the lab. You can’t say that about all jobs in underdeveloped countries.

We finished up our tour of the lab, had lunch and then went for a drive to the coast along the Indian Ocean to Stilbay. What a lovely resort-like town less than an hour from the lab.

Stilbay had a really rocky coast, and the most amazing seashells. Pinks, purples and greens, like nothing I’ve ever seen before.

We spent less than an hour at Stilbay, and we were off for another adventure. It was time to find a way to pack all the things we bought and gathered on our trip and figure our how the heck to get it all home.

I should have taken an extra suitcase. What was I thinking?

After an hour of stuffing and packing, I finally found home for all of my goodies in my luggage. I commandeered a box from the lab and used that to ship my drum and some of the other large things I purchased.

It took some clever arranging, but I managed to fit it all in, millipedes and all.

What? I haven’t mentioned the millipedes yet? Well…let me tell you.

In the bed and breakfast, each room came with a surprising can of bug killer. Bug killer. Whatever could that be for? Much to my surprise, I soon discovered what the bug spray was for, but I didn’t have the heart to use it.

Crawling on the carpet and in all of the corners of my room were millipedes. Yes millipedes. Creepy, crawly, thousand legged millipedes were sharing my room for two nights. They were everywhere. I just didn’t have the heart to spray them, but they did creep me out a little. Especially since it was really cold and I had to turn on the electric blanket in the room so I didn’t freeze to death. I heard millipedes are drawn to water and warmth, so I was certain they would try and crawl into up the covers to get to the heated pad I was sleeping on.

I’m pretty tolerant of all creepy crawlies…until they want to sleep with me. That’s where I draw the line.

So I did what any good steward did, I picked them up and flushed them down the toilet. Why pollute the air with bug spray? I felt bad flushing the little guys, but I knew I would sleep better if I did.

I didn’t need any creepy-crawly dreams the night before I was about to get back on that 20 hour flight. I needed to sleep cause there was no way I was sleeping on the way back. I didn’t on the way over, so I was prepared.

It was lights out and off to bed for tomorrow would be a big day.

We headed out very early the next morning to make the trip westward to Cape Town so I could catch my flight. We decided, on advise from the people we had met, to take a different route back so we could drive through the semi-desert or the Karoo.

Normally, had there been rain this past winter, there would have been gobs of wildflowers blooming in the Karoo. But since there was none, there were no wildflowers.

Just my luck…

I did get to see Chodropetalum tectorum or large cape rush in the wild, which was totally awesome. It grows in the Karoo on the plains in extremely dry conditions. I can honestly say, I’ve never had to stop so many times to see really cool plants along the side of the road in any other country.

I was a kid in a candy store for sure and thank goodness Wilco was driving because I would not have spotted any of these wild treasures. Thanks Wilco!

As we drove over the mountains, and the savannas, I strained my eyes looking for baboons, zebras and gazelles. I saw nothing. We stopped for coffee in a small town along the way and they were out of sweet treats to go with their coffee because, get this…baboons came in and stole them overnight.

Apparently, the baboons are prevalent (except when I’m there), and they are considered pests because they walk right in your house and take your food, so you have to keep your doors locked all the time. I was even told there is a famous Cape Town baboon who goes into houses in the city, opens the refrigerator, wipes you out of food, and then closes the door to the fridge and the house on his way out.

He’s famous…really!

So, why couldn’t I see a baboon? Again, it’s just my luck. I even got out of the car in along the mountain pass where we saw a forest, yes a forest, of protea and I looked and looked for a baboon. It was not wise of me, but I really wanted to see one. There were signs everywhere saying don’t feed them.

I swear! I never saw one. I knew that as soon as Wilco dropped me off at the airport, he would see one. No doubt. He did, but sadly it was a smashed one along the side of the road on the way to the Cape of Good Hope.

No baboons for me…

I made it to the airport and headed home on the 20 hour trek. It’s the longest flight in the World. Literally.

One tip that really helped me survive the flight, because I don’t sleep a wink on airplanes was to take Arnica tablets on each leg of the flight. I also drink a ton of water. I drive the flight attendants crazy with my big refillable water bottle. But…because I drink a lot of water, I get up a lot to go to the bathroom. That’s actually a good thing, especially if you get an aisle seat and don’t have to bother anyone else to get up.

Water and arnica saved me. I had little or no jet lag. Try it!

So why am I at the Independent Plant Breeders Conference this week?

This event is a veritable “Who’s who” of the plant introduction world. Every company that works on breeding and introducing plants is here to meet new independent breeders and to spy on what everyone else is doing and thinking about for the future.

I’m looking for new breeders with cool new plants. I also learned about new molecular breeding techniques and advances that have been made in plant breeding.

It was a great conference in a great setting. We had private access to the Chrysanthemum Festival at Longwood Gardens, where I got to see the thousand bloom mum. Here’s a picture. It is fabulous and if you ever get to visit, it’s well worth the entrance fee.

Longwood just opened a new, renovated wing of the conservatory. It has been under construction for about two years. One of the new additions is the vast living wall they installed. Their living wall is now the longest in the World. Of course it is…it’s Longwood. Its amazing and I cant wait to come back to see the plants all filled in to make the plant wall paper they were looking for.

The best thing about the living wall is that is disguises the enormous group of bathrooms. These are the biggest bathrooms I’ve ever visited and if you know me, you know I’ve visited many bathrooms.

These are impressive. They are each one person or one family restrooms. What’s also impressive is what appears to be a really cool, undulating, red concrete sacrificial alter in the “family” restroom. Haha! Just kidding It’s a baby changing area, but when I walked in for the first time, I got the sacrificial feeling.

All in all it was a good week. Thanks for reading and happy weeding!

Angela Treadwell-Palmer
President, Plants Nouveau

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PS. We have a new plant…imagine that!

To complement our most popular coneflower, Echinacea purpurea ‘Pink Double Delight’ , we have a twin for you. I would like to introduce you to Echinacea purpurea ‘White Double Delight’.

White Double Delight is a sport of Pink Double Delight that occurred soon after Pink Double Delight was introduced. We have trailed it for many years and have now declared it to be nearly identical to Pink Double Delight in every way except for one trait. Where Pink Double Delight is a clear pink, White Double Delight is a clean double white flower.

The two complement each other well and since Pink Double Delight is such a beloved plant in the industry and a grower’s dream, we are hoping White Double Delight will impress everyone just the same.