hybrids registration

[reivilos]

Hello,
I've walked the RHS database using their search.
Initially I wanted to draw the graph of all hybrids made so far. It turned out horrible - impossible to read.
Then I came up with this:

This is the number of paph hybrids registrations per year. As expected, the number of new hybrids increases over time. However there's a drop in the 80s. Anyone knows why?
Olivier

Registrations count per "Originator" to come...

 

[TyroneGenade]

Paphs went out of fashion.

 

[reivilos]

I've only mentionned the first 50, covering 55% of the 23k hybrids.

 

[Erythrone]

Very interesting!

 

[NYEric]

I'm actually thinking of doing some research into the number and location of Paph hybrids registered. I think it will show that CITES enforcement is crippling production of Paphs in some locations.

 

[Shiva]

''However there's a drop in the 80s. Anyone knows why?''

I stopped buying orchids for a while.

 

[NYEric]

Wow!

 

[limuhead]

I think that Paph hybrids went down in the 80's because of Disco. I am pretty sure that if you did some research you would find that Phal hybrids skyrocketed during the Disco era.... :rollhappy:

 

[reivilos]

Yeah but not everybody listens to disco... Not all Paphiomaniacs turned
to phals, did they?

 

[Ozpaph]

I think hybridising markedly increased after the introduction of many new species esp the parvis and increased availablity of species esp in the USA and Europe (as opposed to UK/Ratcliffes).
Can you search what the hybrids were after the dip?

 

[Ozpaph]

I think that Paph hybrids went down in the 80's because of Disco. I am pretty sure that if you did some research you would find that Phal hybrids skyrocketed during the Disco era.... :rollhappy:

........are you saying Disco is over???..................I'm always the last to know!

 

[gonewild]

However there's a drop in the 80s. Anyone knows why?
Olivier

Prior to 1980 Paphs were not common. They were not easy to grow. Good ones were VERY expensive and most of the quality plants were in the hands of only a few growers. So the "hobbyist" did not produce hybrids to register.

During the 80's plants got cheaper and more species became available to use to hybridize. Some of the big growers liquidated stock at lower prices and this made more plants available.

The increase you see in the 90's is the result of crosses made in the 80's...remember it takes some years to bring the seedlings into flower so they can be registered.

 

[Leo Schordje]

How's this for an explaination: In the 1970's and early 1980's species that were largely lost to cultivation were being imported again. Rothschildianum was down to just a handful of plants, when the Collinette Expedition brought back some 50 or so new clones of Paph rothschildianum. A lot of time was spent re-making rothschildianum and other primary hybrids.

Then about 1975 or so, the first vinicolor callosum was identified. The lack of registrations during the 1980s is most likely because VINICOLORS and PRIMARY HYBRIDS were the rage, and everybody was RE-MAKING old 19th century primary crosses using vinicolor callosum and vinicolor Maudiaes. All those old Maudiae hybrids were re-done. Well, the RHS database does not get a 'hit' for a re-make. That's why the low count for new hybrids.

That my thought.

 

[SlipperFan]

Interesting thread -- very interesting charts. Thanks for doing this.

This would make a great article for the Slipper Alliance. Or Orchids Magazine. Or......

 

[cnycharles]

with the oil/gas problems in the 70's and shortages, did this affect heating prices in the mid/late 70's? could be that a bunch of people got out of plants/greenhouses and weren't making new hybrids so they weren't for sale or registered in the 80's? i think the other explanations sound better myself

my other non-slipper take was that the only things available around that time-period were big, waxy plastic winston churchill type things, and nobody wanted to buy them or make hybrids with them (just my phal-species opinion which isn't worth very much) and probably not very accurate, either

 

[gonewild]

with the oil/gas problems in the 70's and shortages, did this affect heating prices in the mid/late 70's? could be that a bunch of people got out of plants/greenhouses and weren't making new hybrids so they weren't for sale or registered in the 80's? i think the other explanations sound better myself

In the 70's I forget the exact date Universal Orchid Company burned and all their Paphs were destroyed. They had been buying up all the high quality plants they could get their hands on so a lot of top breeding plants were lost in one moment. Hundreds of crosses growing in flats were lost.

my other non-slipper take was that the only things available around that time-period were big, waxy plastic winston churchill type things, and nobody wanted to buy them or make hybrids with them (just my phal-species opinion which isn't worth very much) and probably not very accurate, either

Actually everyone wanted to buy them but no one could afford the price of a quality plant. Divisions sold for $500 for a decent plant and awarded clones $1500 and up.

 

[Trithor]

It would be interesting to see the position of new species introduction/rediscovery on your timeline graph. I suspect as others have pointed out, that the reintroduction of horticulturaly desirable species was a big influencing factor (roths and delenatii come to mind) as well as the introduction of the whole parvi group in ?early 80's?

 

[cnycharles]

In the 70's I forget the exact date Universal Orchid Company burned and all their Paphs were destroyed. They had been buying up all the high quality plants they could get their hands on so a lot of top breeding plants were lost in one moment. Hundreds of crosses growing in flats were lost.

bigtime ouch!

Actually everyone wanted to buy them but no one could afford the price of a quality plant. Divisions sold for $500 for a decent plant and awarded clones $1500 and up.

that would have kept me out of the market

one other thing of historical note is that in the 70's and 80's, jim rice orchids in homer ny started really importing a ton of orchid species from all over the world. many of their plants came from old collector's collections, people that jim had met in his travels and most likely had a few beers or such with... when a collector would pass away, their wives would often contact jim and give him the collector's private collection. many of antec's paph species (and some hybrids) came originally from rice's orchids, or from others who bought species from rices. so, many of antec's species and hybrids, that led to awards at and after this time and went into many antec hybrids, came from rice's orchids (and many species that I bought and killed came from there also . )

 

[tim]

dip corresponds to the discovery of callosum 'JAC' (or viniferum or whatever) and a shift in market trends from complex as pot plants to maudiae-types as pot plants; working with less complex breeding material, re-making older hybrids with vini forms of callosum, waning market interest in complexes, increased interest in species and vinis, as well as the loss of major american hybridizers around the 1980s - Tonkins stopped breeding, Frank Hughes stopped breeding, Bob Jones sold his collection, Stewarts and McClellans dropped their complex lines - all this makes for a little dip...

 

[Erythrone]

What about this explanation :

In the 80s, the orchid register decided to take a few sabbatical years

(just kidding...)