As a hybridizer is pains me with what I’m seeing on the judging of miniatures at some of our shows. I have seen miniature bulbocodiums listed in the show as N. bulbocodium 10Y-Y and I have even seen them listed at Hoop Petticoat 10Y-Y. When I protested I was told by the show committee and two members of the miniature committee that when someone takes a bulbocodium bulb from Spain and brings it to the US it is just a bulbocodium. Breaking News: If you take a bulb from Spain it was a named species unless you have made a discovery of a new species. And, it is not a Div 10 bulbocodium, as species bulbocodiums are in Div 13 for species daffodils. The listing of a N. bulbocodium should be div 13 and not div 10.
Secondly, there are still listings of N. cordubensis 13Y-Y in the shows. When I protested that, I was told since Brent and Becky’s bulbs sold it as N. cordubensis it has to be accepted. I checked the Brent and Becky’s Bulb catalog and they have it listed as N. fernandesii var cordubensis which is correct. I also had one exhibitor that reminded me that I withheld a blue ribbon from a collection of 12 miniatures (before COVID) that had listed both a N. fernandesii var cordubensis and a N. cordubenis. They claimed that they can tell the difference between N. fernandesii var cordubensis and a N. cordubenis. Botanist can’t, I can’t. Where are the daffodil police when we need them.
The miniature committee needs to take a close look at this and decide if we are going to use correct labeling or not.
Clay
Clay,
When we included Div 10 in our standard section of the schedule we went through the same problem with the bulbocodiums. We have it correct now. It just took time to educate the exhibitors who found it embarrassing to get it wrong. In botanical terms though I suspect that once a species is removed from the wild and is in cultivation its definition changes. In contrast we use a horticultural definition for our shows. For all our miniature classes in NZ we describe the class as Class 139 Cyclamineus species and or hybrid.
Why do we now have Div 10 in the standard schedule? Because some of us, especially Lawrence Trevanion and Graham Flemming, have bulbocodiums far too big for a miniature. I call them macrocodiums.
And some of our giant bulbocodiums are called Clay’s Gold, King Klay and Pilgrim Fran. Our giant bulbocodiums are getting bigger, taller and fancier. The flowers are over 50mm so there is nothing miniature about them. The bulbs are the size of an intermediate
Graham,
When comes time for ordering from you again, we need to talk about those three, Clay’s Gold, King Klay, and Pilgrim Fran.
Clay