I have a straight-species F. nitida that hasn't shown signs of flowering yet. It's been in the garden since 1997 and is putting out a lot of foliar growth. It's just a matter of time though before it flowers and sets seed. I keep waiting for the fateful season. Meanwhile, I planted two F. nitida "Anceps" last year, and don't recall whether they were clones or seedlings. I am hoping seedlings because I just don't want my F. nitidas all going bust. I've heard that some people's fargesias flowered and put out seed that didn't germinate. Anyone know whether there are many successful germinations?

Wow.... what a great find! Of all the searches I have done for moss on search engines, I never stumbled across the Moss Growers Handbook. Thanks for sharing that Judith. On that Brit site, I found a GREAT link - I was very surprised to find hundreds of moss galley pictures of species of Europe, Venezuela, Brazil, and western France. SEE THE LINK BELOW.... Quite a load of beautiful pictures of so many types of moss from all around the world that are inspiring ....... Very inspiring. p.s. I can't believe I didn't find this moss forum earlier. I'm glad to be onboard! - David N.E. USA zone 5 Here is a link that might be useful: Pictures of Bryophytes (Europe, Venezuela, Brazil, & W.France)

I would busy yourself enjoying and studying the plethora of other maples avaialable here in the states and eventually the plants will be available, you just have to get to know the right people or be lucky enough. You might enjoy Kingsville Variegated as a similar plant to Peve and Diane Verkade originated here on the east coast so it should not be that hard to find if you are set on having it. Unless you are someone like Stanley, there is no way you are going to get Peve Multicolor into the states without bootlegging it some way or another or trading or getting scion wood. The importation of variegated palmatum varieties is prohibited.

From experience sending bud wood to Europe, Germany is one of the more neurotic about RRD and has required full phytosanitary paperwork on EVERYTHING for years. The Netherlands has been (I don't know if they still are) the easiest to get material into as they didn't require any kind of paperwork, AT ALL. I could simply collect, package and mail it and that was all it took. I was assured Germany would be the same, yet the package was returned to me unopened with a demand for RRD clearance. That was five or six years ago, so the Weeks stupidity had nothing to do with it. The comment earlier about the source of Hortico's plants concerned a "gentleman" who supposedly was responsible for sourcing their bare roots in Romania and other "lower cost" countries. He reportedly obtained the plants and had them delivered, again, supposedly, resulting in Hortico's simply removing them from one package, and repackaging the plants, complete with Romanian and other European country soil on the roots and sending on to customers in the United States. He stated he was not paid for his efforts. I don't know how that worked out. What finally killed Pickering was their importing Dutch multiflora seedlings to bud their roses to and our import restrictions requiring the stocks and scions originate in the same country, so they lost more than half their market.