Division 9

The international Daffodil Registrar, Sharon McDonald, has posted the
Division 9 Consultation Document along with two independent papers each
supporting one or other of the two options. I would urge all those
interested in Division 9 to read these carefully and pass any comments you
may have on to Sharon at  title=

Best wishes, Nial Watson

2 comments for “Division 9

  1. Nial,

    In my opinion it would be much simpler and save a lot of convoluted arguments, if we simply subsumed division 9 into division 3, because, except for show purposes, I know of no other good reason for dividing daffodil cultivars into un-natural divisions based on corona and perianth lengths. Moreover, division 3 contains a number of cultivars which, under current definition, could be regarded as division 9 anyway and risk being marked “NAS” at RHS shows, if judged properly.

    John Pearson

  2. John Pearson, et. al.,

    As a member of this consultation who has grown large numbers of poeticus
    seedlings, many with poet species as part of the cross, I would propose a
    clear separation of Divisions 3 and 9 based on ploidy. Almost all fertile
    poeticus are diploid, and produce diploid children. Very few things called
    “poet” are tetraploid.

    Some of the other characteristics we call “poet” are subject to natural
    genetic variation. Crosses coming from species in particular produce
    remarkable variation in corona shapes and colors: Among sister seedlings,
    variation can be from a corona almost fully orange (GOO) to almost fully
    yellow (GYY) with gradations in between. If the rim color disappears, is
    that sister any less a poet than the sister with the rim still visible? If
    pink in other divisions almost certainly comes from poet genes, should a
    faint pink rim on a poet disqualify it as a poet? LIkewise, if a poet with
    Dactyl in its pedigree shows occasional doubling (such as Mitch semi-double
    Adoration 4w-w), is it not still essentially a poet?

    Even unquestioned poet characteristics such as pure white perianth color
    (“poeticus white”) may not reflect the genetic diversity in the species. I
    have poet seedlings with Sir Frank Harrison’s Red Hugh as seed parent that
    have pale orange perianth color. Naomi Liggett has a clump of one of these
    seedlings, and Larry Force has others. The seedling I kept as a select is
    fertile and shows every other poet characteristic, including fragrance.
    Harold Koopowicz in another communication mentioned a picture of a similar
    seedling from an RHS publication dating to the 1910′s. Where does orange
    perianth color come from? Might it be hidden in poet genes?

    Ploidy can be tested. More and more, we are able to look beyond
    phenotypical expression. Shouldn’t we maintain this natural group?

    _____

Comments are closed.