BYU professor Mikel Stevens is a plant hunter . When he ’s hiking in removed parts of the res publica it ’s because he ’s trying to get over down and written document specie of plant and flowers .
Most the time , his efforts give off and he ’s able to receive what he ’s looking for . And sometimes , something special happens .
“ When I saw it , Alexander Graham Bell and whistles went off in my promontory ; I sit there for two or three minute quite stunned at its dish , ” sound out Stevens , a prof of works and wildlife science . “ It ’s extremely rare . If I were to put numbers on this , I would put the hazard of finding it as one in million . ”
Dr. Mikel Stevens discover these new penstemon wildflowers above Soldier Summit . Photo by Mikel R. Stevens
What he run a risk upon was a new and alone form of one of our native wildflowers . Stevens was high on a dirt route just above Soldier Summit when he break a penstemon no one has ever documented — he know because he is an expert in the genus of Penstemon . Roughly 18 inches tall with elongated bell condition blossoms in strong , “ true pink ” colours , including a second of lighter pinkish striping , the flower is unlike anything he ’s ever see in his years of study penstemons .
He believes there is a mutation somewhere in one or more of the genes responsible for for blossoming — perhaps a jumping cistron — that gives the bloom its discrete multi - pink striping , where the colors seem to appear and vanish throughout each bloom . The coloring makes the flower quite a novelty and Stevens believes it could be an appealing cultivar for domestic prime bed if it can be reproduce successfully .
A groom works breeder , Stevens has been cultivate in his laboratory to regurgitate the Modern wildflower ever since he let on it — but it has n’t been easy since the plant does n’t make seed . So far his squad , which included undergraduate students Wesley Crump , Jed Grow and Sarah Harrison , have successfully propagated the genus Penstemon only through nonsexual cuttings . They have also been capable to get the wild flower growing through plant tissue cultures ( in test tubes ) in lab configurations , but have n’t been able to get it to root in tissue paper culture yet .
“ When I found it on the hillside , I hold out back to the remain plant and wanted to collect source and discovered it was n’t develop seed , ” Stevens articulate . “ People involve how would it survive in nature with no seeds ? The reply is it would n’t have outlast in nature . I gamble on to it , but otherwise it was go to exit out . Hopefully we can get it up and go for our garden . ”
Stevens would care to patent the new wildflower to make it commercially available , but to do that he want to get it to reproduce with some flimsy genetic variations from its wild res publica . Plant letters patent are only yield in the U.S. to someone who has devise or develop and multiply a distinct and new cultivar of plant — they ca n’t just pluck it from the mountainside and patent it . It requires “ the bridge player of man ” to be patentable . While he is hopeful that will ultimately materialize , he believes that more than likely this particular bloom will have a more modified sales opportunity as a gewgaw , not a “ blockbuster ” flower .
His stake , for what it ’s worth , is not in making money , but in helping naturalise more drought - tolerant flowers for the time to come .
“ We wo n’t get rich off of this , I just reckon it will be gracious to get it into the public sphere , ” he said . “ We here in the mountain west have very serious water problems coming down the route and we ’re start to require to increase the number of drought - large-minded plant for our urban landscapes . We ’re always going to want a BYU campus with tidy sum of beautiful flowers , but the 24-hour interval will do when we will have to employ less water . ”
origin : Brigham Young University ( Todd Hollingshead )
