I have always wanted to try Gerbera Daisies, but the seeds are so expensive and germination is said to be erratic. Park Seeds wants $8.95 for ten seeds and that does not include shipping. My wife has a plant on the front porch so I snipped a leaf off, cut it into six sections and put them in a tissue culture protocol. Now, all I have to do is wait and see what happens, and, I have no idea of whether this will work or not, but it should be interesting.
jackb
I love what you are doing. It is so interesting to read about your experiments with bits of plant matter and watch them grow. While the rest of us play in the dirt, you do some amazing things.
The reason I got into this was to clone olives, as they are very difficult to clone without misting equipment. Timing of the season and condition of the donor plant are also factors in traditional cloning. The big growers have experienced professionals who tissue culture olives, and they don't share their procedures. It has taken me five months but I finally have developed my own protocol that works. The plant in the photo is a Tosca olive that has only been in culture for a month. It is has new growth above, and, a callus forming on the cut end of the base and roots growing from the callus. In other words, success! So, now in total, I have a dozen clones of six different varieties all responding to culture. And, you would need to look long and hard to find where I took the tiny plant section to start the new plants. Fascinating process to say the least.
jackb