Very exciting, Garry, it'll be interesting to watch it grow.
This could be really spectacular!
Barb

Very cool! 8)
It will be fun to see if its offspring carry that trait.
Here is a naive novice question: can palms be propagated vegetatively? Like with tissue culture methods?
--Erik

It has been done with tissue culture Erik-mostly Date palms and Coconuts but......
One of the major obstacles concerning the practical application of plant tissue culture to mass propagation
has been the difficulty of successful transfer of plant-lets from invitro conditions to a soil medium.
Best success is with meristem portions as they are easier to sterilize-TMI?

Something like 50-90% losses do not make this a viable way to mass produce- as in the case of
crop production-Coconuts,Dates.

There are also(if my understanding is correct)problems with plants developing waxy cuticles on leaves,
this would greatly reduce plants ability to handle stress and of course cold hardiness.

Thanks, Jim. I'll try to learn more about this. No, not TMI!
In college, we did tissue culture propagation of Coleus; pretty easy.
I assume we used Coleus simply because it was easy....
--Erik

Guys- For palms to stay true to type, as well, you'd need to use meristematic tissue, since other tissue, e.g. leaves, can lead to polyploidy and other genetic differences. If I had to guess I'd say that immature cotyledons would be the easiest way to TC palms, since this is the way that it is done in barley... Oh, and it might also be the appropriate tissue to use in genetic transformation experiments too...

As for the adjustment, the plant WILL be fine once they're adjusted to outdoor growth conditions. The genes are still the same, but, since the plants will have been 'babied' in high humidity completely sterile conditions, they will need longer to establish... Oh, and they would be grown without roots for a while too, so you have to allow a longer time for root development! Otherwise, after 2 or so years there should be no difference between a seed grown palm and one from TC. Banana's are routinely TC'd (e.g. most basjoo you buy at nurseires, Siam Ruby, lasiocarpa, etc.) and I'd wager that most of the bananas we grow, unless you grew it yourself from seed or got a division from a friend, would be TC grown... I know for sure that my basjoo was a 'plug' fresh from a TC facility when I bought it!

Thanks for the insight, Paul.
I don't want to get too far from Garry's original topic on his thread, but admit I know very little about TC. Maybe you could start a new thread?
I spent an hour researching palm TC yesterday and was delighted to find that (as Jim said) a lot of work has already been done with commercially important palms. We'll all be busy with palm care the next few months, but this seems like a great February topic when our winter protection is done and Spring is yet to, uh, spring. In the meantime I'll be scheming to find out if cold-hardy palm TC is something I can do with University facilities.... --Erik