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by lathyrus_long
1555 days ago
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Maybe, but I've never heard of anyone buying a wild-collected orchid from a species where commercially tissue-cultured specimens were available. Beyond the ethical question, greenhouse specimens tend to be more perfect, to carry fewer exotic pests and pathogens, and of course to be far cheaper. If such specimens were available of these Conophytums, then I'd guess almost all the illicit demand would disappear. A few people report some success with tissue culture in that genus, e.g. (use Sci-Hub) http://www.bioone.org/doi/pdf/10.25223/brad.n1.1983.a8 https://www.jstor.org/stable/42790034 A highly paywalled article seems to say this hasn't been commercially viable yet, though: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Inability+to+mass+produce... Probably if demand remains high, someone will figure out a protocol and the price will come down. It would probably still take years to grow the plantlets to marketable size, though. Otherwise it looks like various nurseries are propagating them traditionally, but that will take even longer. |
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