At the time of the possible takeover of the Canadian pot rose breeder Keith Laver I had been in touch with Gert and Sophia. Sjef had run into Gert at a Naktuinbouw growers’ gathering in which Gert had delivered a presentation on behalf of RoseRevolt on rose production on coconut peat, the system of bending which was used in Japan and the introduction of the rootstock Natal Briar, coming from Australia. Gert and some fellow attendees of the classes of Dr. van den Peet at Wageningen University had started the rose consultancy RoseRevolt. Afterwards, Gert, from the south of Holland, had confided Sjef that he felt uneasy with his dominant business partner. His wife Sophia, a daughter of a big pot plant grower from the north, was also in for an adventure, possibly abroad.
In my telephone conversation with Gert it turned out, that Sophia had studied breeding and acted as such in her father’s company. The combination of the two would be perfect in case of a Laver takeover and continuation of his breeding. After the deal fell through, Keith had even made a personal offer to me to come to Canada and be his successor…
Anyway, Gert and Sophia’s excitement over the possibility proved to be short-lived.
When, around a year later, I called Gert again to offer a move to Ecuador, he declined for having just entered a new job in Holland. “I understand, but just discuss this with Sophia. Sophia can be the rose breeder in our own greenhouses at La Tolita and Peter Daimler is offering you the position to run the farm.” In our previous conversations I had learned that the tall Sidonia-like Sophia was the extravert, energetic, optimistic counterpart yin of her introvert, careful and contemplative yang, and expected her on the phone.
Indeed, Sophia had immediately looked up Ecuador on the map and in the encyclopedia and before long was jumping up and down with enthusiasm, calling me the next day to make an appointment for further information.
After my trips abroad I always shared my experiences with Seedy and Junior, finding it important for the breeders to know about the different markets. They had already visited the LAVAL breeding and would also go to South America and Africa, one at a time not to lose the attention to our own breeding. Light intensity was important in breeding and in our lengthy discussions about the comparison between breeding in our and Mediterranean conditions, Seedy and Junior eagerly agreed that breeding in Ecuador would definitely be worth the try for crossings with Aura® and some other varieties that, they both argued, needed more light. Peter Daimler was equally enthusiastic about the breeding aspect and even more when learning about Gert’s expertise and was looking for a qualified General Manager.
As to our pot roses, with plan A to avoid the lengthy US quarantine crossed out, plan B was set in motion. The next American tour would take Sep, the young Manager of Anton’s Potrozen, and I from Salt Lake City, to visit the young plants, ‘liners’, producer Heleman’s Hunt, to Florida for a get-together with Kinsinger Brothers, and then California to visit Pour La Mer and Seaview Pots, finishing with a breeders’ blitz on cut rose grower Jack van Klaveren in Carpenteria.
To prepare for the Laver-takeover visit I had already visited Canadian pot rose producers Poeluk and Eastbrook in the Niagara area. At the former I had noticed large amounts of pot mums, suspecting no royalties were paid to Kinsinger. In my follow-up talk with the Kinsinger manager for Holland, who was very thankful as indeed no royalties were paid, it turned out that they also produced large quantities of liners of Von Scholten pot rose varieties. This was no exclusive arrangement, and they had a large greenhouse area that was the designated quarantine area. Here they were able to propagate the incoming varieties and had persuaded the state officials that the ‘growing cycles’ in the quarantine law were much shorter for pot roses than garden roses, which Jackson & Perkins adhered to for the Witte de Wit varieties. Here the single plants had to survive two years, after which the survivors could only then be multiplied.
Sep, the son of the local banker of Big Anton, was a great travel companion, always in a good mood and taking life easy. The visit to the immense Kinsinger farm in Fort Meyers, Florida, was an eye-opener. They propagated all sorts of plants, a lot from seeds, and their pot rose area was spic-and-span. The GM was well-prepared, knowing of the J&P agency and Witte de Wit’s position in the European market. We quickly agreed to draw up a propagation agreement, covered by the J&P agency and send the next batch of varieties to Florida. Next step would be the transfer of the agency at 35% instead of J&P’s 50%. J&P would not be happy. They recently transferred the Dutch cut rose agency to Witte de Wit, causing much chagrin in the traditional breeders’ world and were in vain expecting the Witte de Wit agency for South America in return.
We left Kinsinger early and in high spirits and decided to buy a few sets of Levis 501 jeans, much cheaper here, and go to the famous south beach for some bird watching. The birds were all in college, the boot of the rented car was broken open and the jeans had disappeared. On top, we had a small puncture. No visible damage to the boot, we pumped up the tire at a gas station close to the rental place at the airport and with our spirits returned had a lot of fun on the plane to LA.
Pour La Mer was in the process of installing a brand-new mist house during a previous visit, when I had found Arne, a Danish pot rose expert that had left the farm he had worked for, had taken up a teaching position, but was more than happy to take his family to California. He had introduced a much simpler system of covering the moving tables with some sort of diaper-like cloth. The results were astounding, so the expensive mist installation was never used. Ron did not mind and showed his plants to prove his point. The rose world suddenly was full of happy people, although Ron was seriously testing the Von Scholten varieties.
The last pot rose farm of the tour, Seaview Pots, close to San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, continued to have problems with the mists coming in from the ocean and were thinking of switching to a less light-sensitive crop.
We met Arent Ruighaver, Omer Jefferson Jr, Keith Bartman and Bernd Solf in the Santa Barbara Inn. Another old boys’ night was followed by a short-notice announced visit to Jack van Klaveren. We presented ourselves as representatives of IRBO (to be founded during the next Aalsmeer show, but somehow already active worldwide). A month ago, another member, Piet Staphorst of Terra Blanca, was visiting their agent in the area and, driving by, he noticed rose plants through the glass. He had stopped the car, climbed the fence, and spotted what he thought to be Leonardo® and Esther® and had informed us. Our mission was to define the varieties, count the plants and find out who had supplied them. We knew Dutch propagators were active in the area of mainly growers of Dutch decent in Dutch-style greenhouses.
Once inside, Omer and Arent entertained Jack van Klaveren in conversation, Sep, Keith and Bernd disappeared to different sides of the greenhouse and I when to the packing area and cooler to look for ‘evidence’. Behind the cooler I found boxes with sender stickers of Coen Propagators, the Netherlands. I also found his pesticides storage unlocked and any administration absent, though the very strict Californian laws prescribed this.
Piet had been right. Bernd, Sep and Keith counted around 20,000 plants of Esther® and 12,000 Leonardo®. When we confronted Jack with this and the source of the plants, he admitted to the varieties, of course was going to pay the royalties, but refused to confirm Coen as his supplier. The mention of a call to the California Department of Pesticide Regulation proved very persuasive.
As to his planting of Leonardo® it was agreed that Jack didn’t have to uproot if he would cooperate to have his greenhouse registered as quarantine area. This way, Witte de Wit’s plant patent rights were not lost. No doubt, Terra Blanca would have the same condition, but that was up to Piet Staphorst to decide.
Following the pre-IRBO meeting we had had in Hamburg, this would mean that Coen would be put on the blacklist we had agreed to put together, and all breeders would terminate their propagation license with the pirate. Coen had already been caught in the ‘Guernsey affair’ two years earlier, for varieties of Von Bismarck, Bernd indicated. Forewarned is forearmed.
Back on base in Benthuizen, Maurice was shocked with the Coens’ exposure and preferred to leave their summoning to the Witte de Wit office and subsequent contract termination to me. “You know all the details.”
Time to touch base in the greenhouse.
Rosaline was happily working away at the scribblers. With the music on and a hand mirror on the corner of her desk she was solving the big puzzle with astounding detailed information in bits and pieces from diverse booklets.
‘Rosa’, as she was soon named by her colleagues, enjoyed being surrounded by her male co-workers and part of a respectful team. She loved puzzles and riddles and soon was working on a systemized inventory and history of gene-stock. Dominant parent genes, results of crossings in numbers of seeds and percentage of first and second selections from those seeds, production figures of selections, and parents’ genealogy. “Did you know that our mothers are all codes and the fathers’ pollen often from newly introduced varieties of fellow breeders?” I did not.
Some of the most recent notebooks were in a different and indecipherable handwriting. According to Rosa these were Seedy’s notes. He hardly ever wrote down things and had a terrible handwriting. Rosa showed me. I could only figure out numbers 1, 8 and 0, the rest resembled hieroglyphics.
What happened in Seedy’s tunnel continued to be a mystery, also for Rosa.
Rosa would come up with explanations to questions that had continued to confuse me. Seedy’s “Fucking Chinese!”, which was always accompanied by big smiles of the boys and no explanations, had no racist intentions, but was a reward set by the twins: if the record for numbers of seeds was broken, the greenhouse team was treated to a dinner at the local Chinese restaurant. This had become an annual event after Junior had discovered that crossings with Groupe Ferry’s Sonja® would give large amounts of seeds, but no usable seedlings, but that was not the challenge.
Next, I ran into Seedy and Junior, anxious to hear my latest adventures. “What does Uncle Piet think of your eliminating his old friends? First Van Steenwijk and now Coen. Who’s next?” Indeed, two weeks ago we terminated the contract of Theo Huygen’s Van Steenwijk Plants after it became known that he had exported and not reported thousands of bushes of varieties from various breeders from Limburg to India. A quick telephone round to Von Bismarck, Superplant, Terra Blanca and Rosen Vorbeck had given a unanimous verdict. Salient detail: Huygen was the agent for Groupe Ferry in The Netherlands, but that was up to Alain Ferry to sort out.
I realized it seemed I was on a crusade against the V.R.V., but “you don’t cheat on Witte de Wit”, was my answer.
All V.R.V. members and their Israeli colleagues were invited for a general meeting during the next Aalsmeer flower show, immediately following the foundation meeting of IRBO. Anton Speelman called to discuss further collaboration in South America. “We’ll meet when time comes, Anton.” Hein Lammers inquired with his ‘big’ friend Anton what this meeting was all about. “That’s John’s thing, Hein, you’ll hear.”
Something was in the air.
