Thanks Dave. Why is the garden restricted?

Dax

The NC government does not want it's flora disseminated for commercial gain, so it tightly restricts access to it on rare occasions when collection permits are granted to botanical institutions.

Some of NC's reefs now a World Heritage Site. See, e.g., http://english.sina.com/p/1/2008/0709/170640.html

Let's hope that this has spillover effect on flora and fauna.

It seems to me that wide dissemination of their plants through whatever means, including commercial, would lead to increased protection of rare species. Of course any collection would have to be strictly controlled until cultivated stock would be enough to fulfill reproduction demands. Perhaps, if the NC government is worried about other people profiting off of their flora, they could obtain patents on any material collected so they would profit from any commercial reproduction of their flora as well.

I don't think it would cut down on any eco-tourism. I for one would still want to visit these plants in their only wild habitats on earth, even if I got to see them in cultivation.

Very well put, kman04 !!

"wide dissemination of their plants through whatever means, including commercial, would lead to increased protection of rare species.color>"

I said as much some time ago, and still haven't seen any valid arguments to the contrary.

Politics sucks.

I cannot, of course, speak for the NC governmnet, but I also do NOT believe the NC government's restrictions on collecting and export ultimately have a salutory effect on the survival of their native flora. Neither am I truly convinced that they are all that interested in actually protecting and preserving that flora. Even as they place obstacles for collection by even reputable botanical/horticultural institutions, they make no effort to stop rampant development, mining, and forest fires (some intentionally set) which utterly ravage huge areas of priceless flora, and only very meekly fund the most modest efforts at local propagation and preservation (although these modest efforts do constitute a major improvement over a decade ago).

In all honesty, the collection/export restrictions have more to do with a desire to prevent other countries from commercially profitting from NC flora (as opposed to the NC's own commerical profits in horticulture which are negligible, and not being developed). "We don't want you to make money off our native resources." Throw in a dash of Anti-Americanism, a slavish, counterproductive adherence to IUCN paradigm thinking, and, voila. There you have it.

Silly thing is, the profits that could be made from the species internationally are minimal, since the species are mostly tropical cloud forest plants that won't grow in the gardens of 98% of the world's wealthier gardeners. They can only ever be of limited value to a very small number of enthusiasts like us here.

Resin

Ah pity you didn't make those links clicky,can't get to em with me phone.

Sundacarpus amarus
Agathis australis: Female cone
Agathis lanceolata: Female cone
Araucaria hunseteinii
Araucaria hunseteinii: Flush

Resin,

You are correct. Even more ironic is that, if a treaty could be fashioned so that the plants could be sold freely, and even a tiny portion of all sales of any plants sold by nurseries went back to the countries of origin to fund conservation, those countries would be better able to protect the extremely vulnerable populations in the wild.

But human nature makes it highly unlikely that such a legal structure would ever be crafted, implemented, or effectively enforced. Bloody human nature.

Have I got it wrong, or is not something like that already in place regarding Wollemi Pine? Talking of human nature, everyone is grousing at the price of them, but then we humans have always wanted it all ways! Now that's human nature for you...

I guess that the NC gov't must have been p-o'd at the smashing success of the False Aralia (Dyzygotheca elegantissima -- one of the most popular house plants world-wide), and the fact that it didn't make everyone in NC a millionaire....

So, to hell with any risks to small populations of rare indigenous plants -- just slam on the export control law...