Fern Hunting for Polypodium Cultivars - Why AreFinds Historically Sporadic?

摘要

When I first joined the Society, my interest was purely in the rarer species and trying to see as many of them as possible growing wild. Aided mainly by Victorian books I found quite a few, but it did not take long to realise I was running out of target species to hunt with any realistic chance of success. I had become very friendly with Jimmy Dyce during this early part of my membership, and he increasingly told me about the existence of wonderful cultivars. Eventually his enthusiasm rubbed off - gradually I became interested!One of my questions to him, and others, was why are no new cultivars being found these days? Before I was a member, Society excursions (usually only one or two a year) were often directed at hunting cultivars. Scans through the British Fern Gazette for the 1950s and 1960s show very few cultivars were found, and attendance numbers were usually well below ten, most elderly.