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A PASSION FOR PLANTS Ed’s Blue Dragon I


think that everyone of a cer- tain age knows that inven- tions can be patented, a process and legal definition that gives an inventor the right and protection to profit from an invention. But did you know that plants can also be patent- ed? It’s true, and you can tell if you’re buying a patented plant by looking carefully at the label. If you see the letters PP or PPAF followed by numbers, then you’ve got a patented plant. What does that mean to you? Well, it means that you cannot legally propagate that plant for sale. What does it mean to the nursery/grower? It usually means that three to ten years of breeding and selection followed by six to eight months of patent application (a $2 to $3,000 process) has culminated in a new plant offering. A new plant that will produce royalties for each sale during the twenty years a patent lasts.


So, why am I telling you all of this? Well, back in the 1980s, my dad, Ed Carman (in California) and his good friend, nurseryman Trevor Davies (in New Zealand) were each (cooperatively) collecting named wisteria cultivars in an effort to gather the true examples of each. This effort included letters travel- ing all over the world following rumors of the fabled red wisteria, and the elusive true (super dark, double purple) “Black Dragon.”


by Nancy Schramm greenthumb@carmansnursery.com


One of Ed’s nurseryman friends was


Toichi Domoto (Domoto Nursery, Hayward) known for many plant intro- ductions, especially peonies, and respon- sible for supplying many of the plants originally purchased by the Roth family for Filoli in Woodside. In 1988, Toichi gave Ed some wisteria seed. According to Ed’s oral history, he


adsales@outandaboutmagazine.com WISTERIA


“planted a bunch of seedlings, and in three years some of them started to bloom, and one of the first ones to bloom was a dou- ble one, which I thought was very unusual…Since then I’ve had three or four more doubles bloom out of that same seed batch.” Well, I was in charge of watering these plants in the 15- gallon cans, and Dad told me to watch out for them. I did, and in 1996 one looked different when it started blooming, I told Dad he’d better take a look, because it was double, and looked really blue rather than the typical purple of Wisteria floribunda “Violacea Plena.” He agreed, and sent starts to Trevor who had begun working with Paul Turner of NZ Liners. They grew them on, and both agreed when they saw the flow- ers that the double blue was indeed unique. So Paul started the l-o-n-g process of building up stock and applying for a plant patent. And all during that time we could not sell this double blue wisteria. Once a plant has been sold or even


advertised for sale, a clock starts ticking, and you have only one year to apply and be granted a patent, or you have forever lost the opportunity. Time passed. Years. Ed consulted with Pete Sugawara (Montebello Nursery, Los Altos) about a possible name, and asked Toichi for his opinion.


Out & About • June 2011 13


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