Jacksonville "at home" Tissue Culture Class

Hey guys and gals,
There will be an "at home" tissue culture class on July 23, 2005 in Jacksonville, Florida at Tree Hill. The class is from 8:30 to 4pm. It will teach you the basics of tissue culture so you can do it at home (without the thousands of dollars of equipment used in uiniversity labs). It is a quick and easy to understand process, and uses readily available products you can obtain from Walmart or Kmart. Check out Dr. Stiff's website, its worth it! Please pass the info on to your plant buddies that might be interested in this. The class will be capped at 20 students and if there is enough interest there will be another class hosted. The cost is approximately $90 and lunch is provided. If you need any further information email me at home botanyguy@comcast.net or contact Dr. Stiff at the following
Carol M. Stiff, Ph.D.
Kitchen Culture Kits, Inc.
www.kitchenculturekit.com
936-699-3551 FAX 936-699-3553
kck@turbonet.com

Who is sponsoring the class. It would be nice if it was available at other locations around the state or as an online class.
Jan...

I will show my ignorance and ask, "What is tissue culture?"

The price is a bit steep for my budget, but it sounds like it will be a good course.

Jeremy

Growing plants from like a small peice of tissue.. I am sure you have seen it on TV somewhere.. a type of cloning plants

Sounds fascinating! I've not seen it on TV, but then I rarely get a chance to watch TV. I seem to be either on-line chatting with DG folks, out in my garden, or doing whatever action is needed to try to stay one step ahead of the steam roller that seems constantly at my heels!

Jeremy

Jeremy, lets try to go to this class.
It sure is interesting. All of the Hostas I have in my little Hosta nursery in the backyard were from Tissue Cultures.
Maybe Norma and Diann will come too and you and Botonyguy have a great deal in common........You both like plants, lol.
sidney

I would enjoy the class. From what I can discern on the webpage from the link above, Dr. Stiff can accept credit cards. I could go in debt a little deeper and join you at the class. I thought I would have some extra cash this month after the successful art show, but I'm still trying to coordinate with a few of the people that bought paintings to exchange art for money. I have a ready supply of the former, but just can't seem to grow much of the latter.

Did you send in the registration form that is available at the webpage? That seems to be the first step in getting signed up for the class so that Dr. Stiff can determine if there is enough interest in the class to make the trip worthwhile. The fees for the class seem to depend on how many students will attend - around 20 students for the approx. $95 rate, or a higher rate if there are fewer students.

Jeremy

I didn't send any forms yet, but will when i get home Sunday.
sidney

Hmmm! I visited the site and it looks very promising to me.
I have often seen this done on TV, but they never give enough details. Usually it was done in a lab atmosphere by either French or Dutch lab tech's, so I didn't pay much attention to the few details that were given.
I think I will research it more and perhaps give it a try. Not for everything, but for that once in a while when something special comes along that you really want to have.
A good example would be a plant that I saw on a visit to a new friend's garden this past week. On the inside garden patio there was a plant who's leaves resemble green butterflies. Of course I couldn't even ask for a cutting because it looked very rare, but if I knew how to do this tissue culture thing, perhaps she would have been willing to part with a leaf.
I enclosed a close up of the plant that appeared in one shot of her inside patio garden.
Thanks for posting this information on tissue culture.
Art

Yes Art, that's a nifty plant. Is it a type of Poinsettia?
sidney

I don't really watch much tv, but I did see it on the back of the Nourse Catalog. When I saw that, I thought it would be fantastic to learn. I looked on their website as noted above, about the classes. Says working on getting the class in PA. I hope they do, so I can attend too!!! You have a great opportunity. Let us know all about the class!!! ~ Suzi :)

I agree with Budgielover, can we find any classes in other locations in Florida? I would love to take one, I am in Central Florida.

Go to that website. Talk to them about arranging one for your area! I am going to call tomorrow, to see about possibility of having in Pittsburgh area. Good luck, the more that know this stuff, the better!! ~ Suzi :)

Dr Stiff looks like she is cancedlling the class this time around, she didnt get enough students interested... so she is going to take names and give a location for the next class... I am going to UF next week, there is a class there put on by IFAS. They will be teaching TC, and well I'll be sure to pass on the information I get there to you all.. Sidney, once our lab is done at the house I will surely shoot you over the invite...

Chris

Sugar, Val told us what it was, but my feeble mind can't remember that much and I forgot. Next time I communicate with her I will ask.

Art

Sorry to hear your class is getting cxl's Jax! ~ Suzi ♥

Chris,

Yes, please post about the UF class, that sounds like good information.

Mary

Art has written at some length about Tissue Culture http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/527005/
After reading over the info on this site above, I think I will wait til Jeremy has it down, lol.
sidney

The TC propagation method may require quite a lot of patience, and I seem to have a short supply of that lately. I keep flitting about my garden from one unfinished project to the next, but I'm always game to learn something new. Maybe we can send one representative to the class and have a workshop on TC at our Lake City roundup in October?

Jeremy

Art, the plant in your photo is a Christia, there are two color forms of it that I know of, one a darker purple than the other in the background color. If you have it, it is on page 546 of Tropica (1st edition) and is in the legum family.

Mary

TC in gainesville was closed to the public.... just for us educator types sorry.. and its full as well.. will be more then willing to help you all out when I get back... see what happens! I am building the lab slowly but surely here at the house... so when all of us kitchen experimenters get online and start our own thing.. we can share results...

Chris

What are the advantages of Tissue Culture to the home gardener?? I can see where it would be very helpful to firms like Jackson Perkins who want to generate a million rose bushes identical to some given rose or even to large nurseries or specialty growers (like Orchid or Iris producers) where they need to generate 1000's of identical plants at one time and, perhaps, even to farmers. But why would the home gardener want to generate thousands or millions of plants identical to some given plant? He can only use a few plants for himself and he can only give away so many. Also the semi-laboratory conditions required to successfully use this approach means a much greater outlay of cash to equip your kitchen or semi-lab to actually, successfully carry out tissue cultures. Then you have to worry about how to care for and what to do with the 100,000 orchids you have cloned assuming success. To me it seems like the usual methods of propagation of plants are more suitable and perfectly adequate for the home gardener.

ed I agree, but just because we can't sell to each other unless we have a off- DG site, so to speak, doesn't mean I can't learn how to produce several of some plant I want to do a mass planting to earn some extra $.
Also, reproduction of a special plant for swaping with others is always fun. I dont think 1,000s were in my plan.
sidney

I toy with the idea of developing some new cultivars by selective breeding (especially for some wildflowers/weeds that I think have potential for garden specimens if their flowers are enlarged or changed a bit). I can see some value in at-home TC in being able to replicate the cultivar once it has all the desired attributes. I would also not be thinking in terms of thousands or millions, just enough to
satisfy myself that there were enough to go around.

Jeremy

I would like to be able to do it just for myself too, in many cases to get a few more of a special plant as insurance. It is another weapon in the arsenal, the way that I see it.

Mary

I would have a couple of reasons to be able to do this.

First, to be able to copy an unusual, not common plant would be right at the top.

Second, being a cutting vs seed person, it's much easier to get one good leaf vs one good cutting.

Third I like to grow things just for the sake of being able to do it. I do a lot of experimenting with my plants and get a kick out of creating something different. Using this I would be able to experiment to try to create a plant with my own choice of colors or features.

I think it would be a cool hobby.

Art

Well, Good Luck guys!

Here is an URL which might be helpful to the home gardener hobbyist:

http://www.une.edu.au/~agronomy/AgSSrHortTCinfo.html

Here is another URL which shows how it is done on a larger scale:

http://users.ugent.be/~pdebergh/

:-)

Maybe we can get a tissue culture section here and start up a group...

Gup

size123 Thanks for your information about Christia. I finally found a site with a good picture, and wouldn't you believe, it's the same place Val, Molly & I met at our first visit to a local nursery (Top Tropicals.)
They have a huge listing of plants where you can click on most species and bring up a good picture of one they have growing there.
The picture I attached is from their site.
Using tissue culture and other techniques, couldn't you just picture this plant with a yellow background and black stripes, or orange background and black stripes, or how about blue background with black stripes. Think of the possiblities.
Art
This photo copyright Top Tropicals

Here is another interesting URL calledTissue Culture In The Home Kitchen which shows all the home versions of the equipment and supplies you need to collect and offers a step by step recipe for Tissue Culture for "Home Kitchen" Genetic Engineers. :-)

http://www.omnisterra.com/botany/cp/slides/tc/tc.htm

Thanks edfinney, good links.
sidney

Hi Ed, That's a great link with good clear explanations showing how easy this could be. I also like the suppliers they provide. Just goes to show how much information is available on this subject.
Art

I am just a science geek and I give most of my plants away.... maybe one day it could be a business.. but most of what I am learning is #1 for my degree and #2 just for fun.. which is directly related to #1... my degree has nothing to do with my career field at all... but all it matters to me is I finally got to do some TC... Its kinda like taking cuttings, or growing from seed, just another tool in you belt to do business with... I mean even on Ebay they sell flasked orchids raised from seed... They use TC to make the seeds grow..

Well enough! :0) Off to pick snails off my brugs...
Chris