Plant Heritage Conserving Cultivated Plants

1. Plant HeritageConserving Cultivated Plants Plant Conservation and National Plant Collections

2. Our conservation policy • Conserving cultivated plant diversity • Understanding and documenting cultivated plant diversity, and using it sustainably • Educating and disseminating information about cultivated plants and their conservation • To communicate, network and cooperate with other organisations to facilitate our priorities

3. How do we achieve these objectives? • Develop a working list of threatened taxa • Assign conservation status to taxa • Provide methods for plant conservation based on best practice • Identify cultivated plant hotspots • Link in-situ and ex-situ conservation where appropriate • Act to mitigate threats where possible • Communicate and educate

4. Developing a working list of threatened taxa and assigning their conservation status • A new project to create a ‘Red List’ of cultivated plants • Deciding which cultivated plants are most in danger of extinction and concentrating our resources on them

5. Providing methods of plant conservation based on best practice • National Plant Collections • Plant Exchange

6. Conservation in collections Types of collection: species v cvs., wild collection, plants of garden origin Heritage Scientific

7. Conservation in collections-the past 1978- Concern about the amount of plants being lost to cultivation Also about the decline of large country estates and the resources to maintain them Many existing collections from institutions and large public gardens were added to the scheme en masse As many of the participants knew each other there was very little rigour or transparency in the process

8. Conservation in collections- the present • 600-650 collections for the last 10-15 years • 450 collection holders from botanic gardens and national organisations to private individuals in their back gardens • Collections are brought to us, people collect what they are interested in, which is quite often what is fashionable • No method for conserving rare cultivated plants that don’t fall under the scope of a collection • Dwindling membership numbers, and financial resources

9. Issues with collections Succession Relevance to environment Relevance to conservation Box ticking Loss of interest Fashion Standards

10. Collection requirements 75% of RHS Plant Finder or appropriate reference 3 of each taxon Records to include name, date of accession, source if known, accession number Make available material for propagation, make available the collection for reference Correct nomenclature

11. Application process Register application Forward plant list which is sent to referee (ICRA, existing collection holders, experts) Collection visited by local volunteer, application form completed, requirements agreed. Application considered by Plant Conservation Committee

12. Addressing the issues Succession policy Discussion and planning of collections within large organisations Proactive recruitment

13. Conservation in collections-the future Proactive recruitment of collections- Missing genera and top ten missing genera Research into what actually is rare- the threatened plant project Dispersed collections Hot spots Link in situ and ex situ conservation Act to mitigate threats Communicate and educate Network!

14. Identify cultivated plant hotspots • Another new project designed to safeguard plants in need of conservation that would not qualify as a national plant collection

15. Link in-situ and ex-situ conservation Encourage the exchange of knowledge between collection holders and those in the country of origin of the plant Encourage study of plants in their native habitat where appropriate Encourage the use of National Plant Collections as ex-situ resources where possible.

16. Act to mitigate threats Make representations to government and other organisations in the interest of cultivated plant conservation Act to make conservation a priority within horticulture

17. Communicate and educate Communicate the importance of cultivated plant conservation to the public Educate the public in the value of cultivated plants Enhance the coverage of conservation of cultivated plants within the field of education Emphasise the importance of skills associated with cultivated plant conservation and the need for them to be passed on Emphasise the need for botanists, taxonomists and other professionals in the field of cultivated plants Cooperate with other similar organisations in the furthering of our objectives