My first posting to the group and I jump into a potentially serious problem.
Liz Fox wrote on 17 Feb about her experiences with viruses in orchids and
Nepenthes, no doubt in response to all the postings recently.
We all need to be more aware of the danger of selling and trading infected
plants......as Liz points out, she lost a huge orchid collection due to one
infected plant coming in. If you have a sizable collection it may be wise to
quarantine new plants and test them before introducing them into your main
collection.
Note: there are a few viruses that are can be transmitted via pollen and seed
but I don't know if this is the case in any of the CP genera. This might be a
useful research project for someone in light of the conservation work being done
with these plants. It would be a serious biological problem if we were to
introduce a previously unknown virus into a wild nepenthes population for
example.
It would be of great help for any of those in the group who have
experiences with the virus test kits to post. Anyone know of
sources/prices for home sampling kits or labs that provide services. I
know there are some out there but have no current information. Perhaps
some of you are, or know, serious orchid growers. I suspect the Orchid
FAQ must have something on this. Anyone know it's URL on the web?
As my propagation professor in college was so fond of saying, "cleanliness is
next to godliness". Let's not have our generosity in sharing plants be our
undoing.....a little vigilance can go along way.
Best wishes to all.
-Scott
Scott Gregory Vergara
P.O. Box 669
Burley, Washington 98322-0669 USA
svergara@pacific.telebyte.com