Paph. Spiderman 'Shippo' HCC/OSSEA

[John Elliott]

Heather,
Thanks for the clarification, I'll tell Peter.

 

[Candace]

I do believe he's confusing us with a different forum!

 

[SlipperFan]

I do believe he's confusing us with a different forum!

I agree -- the other slipper forum, to be exact.

 

[AquaGem]

Peter’s email:

Hi John.

I have just read the whole Paph. Spiderman 'Shippo' HCC/OSSEA thread on Slippertalk.com, and I'm really quite annoyed at the way Jason Ong (aka "AquaGem") has portrayed me and my expertise. On the 20th Feb, AquaGem made the following statements about me:

I brought a Paph. coccineum to be judged, and I was told by one of the judge, also a taxanomist and a published author, Peter O'Byrne, that he has no idea about Paph. coccineum. I would have accepted his excuse if that was a recently discovered plant, but that plant has been around for over 10 years which makes his excuse quite.... (speechless).

I am particularly pissed-off at the cowardly way Jason Ong has posted personal comments about me on a forum where I am barred from responding. He didn't even 'cc the comments to me so I could see what he was saying. I really would like to set the record straight on a few issues:

a) I am not a taxonomist, and I have never claimed to be one. Other people might have described me as a taxonomist, but that doesn't make it true. After years of working with orchids I've picked up a good deal of info about taxomony, but that doesn't make me anything more than an amateur. I challenge Jason Ong to cite one instance where I have described myself as a taxonomist.

b) I am not a regular judge, and I have never claimed to be one. I have absolutely no interest in judging. As you know, my involvement in judging is entirely reluctant (meaning I usually get dragged in at the last minute when the panel is desperate to make a quorum) and is subject to certain conditions, one of which is that I WILL NEVER BE ASKED TO JUDGE A SLIPPER ORCHID. If Jason Ong had done his homework, he would have known this. Check my record: I have never been on a panel that judged a Paph, and I never will. My stance on Paphiopedilums is extremely well-known; I am simply not interested in them.

c) At the OSSEA meeting in question, Jason Ong approached me directly about judging his plant. Such an approach is ethically unacceptable; the exhibitor should deal with the Secretary of the Judging Panel and not go hassling individual Panel members (especially reluctant ones who have zero interest or knowledge of the genus in question). In order to maintain a degree of objectivity, Panel members are not even told who the owner of the plant is, so for an award-seeking exhibitor to try to discuss his plant with the members of the judging panel beforehand is a clear subversion of the Judging process.

d) I did not tell Jason Ong that his plant should not be judged. In fairness, he hasn't made this claim .... although just about everything else he wrote is a distortion of fact. I told him that I could not judge his plant because I was not familiar with Paphiopedilum coccineum. My statement was 100% true when I made it, and it remains 100% true today. My total experience of this taxon is: I have seen P. barbigerum once (in October 2007), I have seen photos of P. barbigerum var. sulivongii in-situ (Sept 2008), but before Jason Ong approached me at the OSSEA meeting, I had never seen P. coccineum. This is not enough experience to formally judge a plant, and I said so. I do not understand why Jason Ong thinks I deserve a public flaming simply because I was honest with him. He certainly hasn't been honest in his portrayal of me !

e) According to the Kew website (accessed today, 5.5.2011 at 6:40 pm), P. coccineum. is a syn. of P. barbigerum var. barbigerum. OSSEA would have been in error to judge it (let alone award it) as either P. coccineum. or P. barbigerum var. coccineum.

f) Jason Ong thinks that just because a plant has been around for 10 years, someone who doesn't give a toss about Paphiopedilums should know all about it. Let's put the boot on the other foot. I would like to give Jason Ong 4 weeks notice (far more than the few minutes he gave me) that I will ask him to judge a plant to the next OSSEA meeting (Sunday 5th June, ie in 4 weeks time). The species I'll bring in has been around for more than 100 years, but I won't tell him the accepted name; rather, I'll refer to it by a fairly recent synonym. Let's see how Jason Ong copes under the same conditions he thinks I should operate under.

John, I'd be obliged if you could post this email on the Paph. Spiderman 'Shippo' HCC/OSSEA thread on Slippertalk.com.

Thanks,

Peter O'Byrne

It isn’t even worth my time and energy to respond to your claim that I am a coward.

a) During the same time when my Paph. coccineum was rejected to be judged by you, you have also rejected judging another plant of mine, Bulb. fascinator. You claimed that it is not a true fascinator and that it is probably hybrid. I then went on to mention to you that the AOS have judged and gave a few of this species an award. My plant of Bulb fascinator looks exactly like those on the awards quarterly. You then went on to mention that AOS had also send you some Dendrobium species which was given a probationary award to be confirmed and identified and that you had told them that the plants was not true to what it was named. You then mentioned to me that they went head to award it despite your confirmation. Even though you did not openly claim that you are a taxonomist, the statements you make certainly implied so. If you are not a taxonomist, then what give you the authority to reject a plant just because you claim that my Bulb. fascinator is a hybrid? Doesn’t that mean that your armature taxonomic opinion has a very big influence upon what was brought in for judging? Isn’t it unfair to the owner of the plant or to the plant that was brought in for judging? I always have the impression that the plant should be judged according to the name it was registered and a probationary award to be given and have the plant be confirmed by a recognized taxonomist before the award can be confirmed? If so, then why was my plant not given that opportunity? I understand that there were a few new species that were described, named and eventually published by you. Aren’t these supposed to be the job description of a plant taxonomist? If you claim to be just an armature then why not leave these jobs to a qualified professional instead?

b) If you are not a regular judge and never claimed to be one then why are you there to judge my plants? If the judging session is a closed session and no public is allowed to be present during the judging session then why are you involved in the judging of my plants or any other people’s plant? At this point I MUST ask the judging committee why the double standard? Why are you asking a non-professional untrained person to judge a plant? If you are not interested in paphs but yet the back cover of your book shows a photo of you dressed up as a Paphiopedilum instead of a Dendrobium, Vanda or even a Cattleya? This is all so contradictory to all your claims.

c) Corrections!! I did not approached you after the judging session but my I was ask to go over to your group and I was told by you guys as to why both of my plants were not awarded. No conversations had taken place between any of the judges and I prior to that session. If I had approached you like you have claimed, and that you had felt that it was inappropriate, you could have decline to make a comment and told me what you have written here… approach the secretary of the judging panel? All you have said just doesn’t make sense.


d) Where in my post did I mention about you saying it should not be judge? I said that you told me you couldn’t judge it because you are not familiar with this plant and therefore cannot judge it. Are you trying to say that since you are not a regular judge or a credit judge that it is the fault of the Judging committee to have asked you to judge?

e) The topic in question now is not weather OSSEA would have been in error. If the judging panel were to be a professional group of qualified judges, then they would have known that they could get most of the info by looking it up on the net. Just Google Paph. barbigerum var. coccineum and most of the information will pop up within seconds. Did they do any research before rejecting the plant? If not, what is their protocol for judging a plant?

f) Challenge accepted on the condition that all the members of the public will be allowed to be present during the judging session to promote in what I believe in. Since every plant has to be judge by a minimum of 3 judges, I will invite 2 other persons to be on my team. If the OSSEA committee agrees, I will also have the press present during the session to be a witness that it won’t be a bias event. According to OSSEA's rules, name of the plant presented for judging will have to be summited at least 24 hours prior to the date of judging, at least that was what i was ask to do every time I wanted to submit a plant for judging.

 

[AquaGem]

I'm curious how this story wil develop, I hope you will keep us updated.

Well.... John has send me an email to inform me that he will not be involved in any of my plants during the WOC. I guess he didn't get my point that it is not who judges my plants or anybody's plants but the attitude and commitments they make as a judge.

He also noted about my resignation from the society with regret.

I am so disappointed that till now the judging committee still don't get it.

This was email to me a few days before the date when my plants were presented to them for judging:

1) I will try to arrange the judges.

2) The plant would need to send a third party location,e.g, Botanic Garden, House 3 at NUS -Bukit Timah Campus or someone else nursery. Will let you know.

3) There is fee involves since it is not going to be at Monthly Meeting. Will let you the cost.

4) Here are some question you need to answer:

i) What is the plant full name ?

ii) If Hybrid, Is it registered with RHS? If No, can you provide the breeder name?

iii)If Hybrid, can you provide the seed parent name and pollen parent name?

iii) Has this plant been judged before ? [OSSEA or other organisation]

iv) Are you the owner of this plant ?

v) How long have u grown it ?

vi) What is the growing condition ? [greenhouse with control temp, outdoor, indoor, cold room,greenhouse without control temp]

vii) Why do you think this plant deserved to be judged? [high flower count, good form, rare plant, flower size bigger than others]

viii) If you plant is awarded, what name would you like to add ? e.g. "Aqua Gem", "Lucky Five"

ix) Are you able to provide a photo of the plant's current state?

Peter's statement about my posting on this forum and about him being barred from this forum without first finding out if it was this forum before making this accusation shows clearly the point I have been trying to make about the group..... sigh... oke:oke:

 

[AquaGem]

With regards to point (f): f) Jason Ong thinks that just because a plant has been around for 10 years, someone who doesn't give a toss about Paphiopedilums should know all about it. Let's put the boot on the other foot. I would like to give Jason Ong 4 weeks notice (far more than the few minutes he gave me) that I will ask him to judge a plant to the next OSSEA meeting (Sunday 5th June, ie in 4 weeks time). The species I'll bring in has been around for more than 100 years, but I won't tell him the accepted name; rather, I'll refer to it by a fairly recent synonym. Let's see how Jason Ong copes under the same conditions he thinks I should operate under.

The notice was email to the secretary of the judging committee at least 24 hours in advance. Whether Peter got notice of the plant name or not was not my responsibility. No one was rushing them for a timeline to have the plant judged. He and the other judges could have taken a little more time to search for more info on the web etc.

I will give Peter 2 weeks grace to do more research before announcing which plant he will be bringing for the challenge better still, I will let him bring two different species in since he was kind enough to offer the 4 weeks advance notice to let me know the name of the plants. Therefore, we will wait patiently until 23 May for him to announce his choice of plant. Since he is not barred form this forum, I am sure he will have no problem in posting the name here for all to see. If he feels that it is too much of a hassle to register on this forum just to announce the name of a plant, I'm pretty sure John Elliot will be more than happy to post it for him since he was so helpful to post Peter's statement on this forum on his behalf.

If I was not able to give a fair and satisfactory judgement for these 2 plants which will be evaluated by all the members here and any other forums or any credited AOS judges, I will give up showing orchids, making any comments with regards to OSSEA and participate in any local orchid events for the rest of my life. What is Peter willing to give up if I am able to proof that there are better ways to judge these 2 plants than the way he and the other judges handled mine?

 

[Pete]

a public forum is not the place for this. especially our nice little forum here. nobody here has anything to do with any of these issues. please keep it between the parties involved. this forum is for sharing information and photographs, not for making fun off or going off on people/topics.

 

[toddybear]

Wow!

 

[AquaGem]

a public forum is not the place for this. especially our nice little forum here. nobody here has anything to do with any of these issues. please keep it between the parties involved. this forum is for sharing information and photographs, not for making fun off or going off on people/topics.

Pete, I had no intention of making it to be such a big issue until was was being blackmailed by OSSEA to retract my posts here about the attitude and professionalism of the judges. You can see from all the earlier correspondence between OSSEA and me, I was only stating the facts and in no way attacking them with false accusations.

 

[Heather]

Personally, I think that since the demands of OSSEA specifically requests removal of statements posted on this forum, in order for Jason to receive his previously promised reward, this is probably the perfect place to have the discussion.

As long as the behavior of the people involved doesn't break any forum rules, I see no problem with this.