Rlc. Memoria Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton m. Splash'

[SouthPark]

I had been super interested in acquiring Rlc. Memoria Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton' for a very long time. I finally managed to acquire a few mature plants of 'Sweet Afton' - fingers crossed that the plants (flowers) will at least look something like the original plant (flowers) from Stewart's --- because so much mericloning had been done, and mutations have been seen. So I hope that my plants are actually 'Sweet Afton'. Chances are good - a well-known orchid nursery had these stashed for quite a long time.

While the relatively-old 'Sweet Afton' cultivar appears to be obtainable without too much effort in USA, Japan, UK, Brazil (maybe) ..... it seems hard to find here in Australia --- these days.

This attached photo is not of 'Sweet Afton'. It's a mutation from it. For the moment - it's the closest I've ever come to 'Sweet Afton'. This photo was taken by the previous owner (a well-known grower of orchids in Australia), and he very generously sold this orchid to me this year.

Will take more photos for the next flowering!

The name I am putting down isn't official. I am tagging it as Rlc. Memoria Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton m. Splash', which pays tribute to the originator and name 'Sweet Afton', and m. is for mutation occurred, and 'Splash' is for the colouring in the petals, which doesn't occur in 'Sweet Afton'.

Nice to share this photo with everybody here on orchidboard.

[Ray]

You sure it's not a hybrid made with Helen Brown?

There's not a great deal of splash-petaled genetics in the background that would lead to this.

[Roy]

This is a "Selfing" of Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton'.
Rlc. Mem. Helen Brown & whatever you want to call it but NOT 'Sweet Afton'.
This has been around for many years & from memory, its lucky to be in flower. Reported to be a complete dog.

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by Ray

You sure it's not a hybrid made with Helen Brown?

There's not a great deal of splash-petaled genetics in the background that would lead to this.

I didn't think about the chance of it being merely a result from the grex hybrid Memoria Helen Brown. It's plausible though Ray - if I question the tag. Although, I wouldn't be surprised about a mutation from 'Sweet Afton' leading to a touch of perloric look.

We've certainly seen (online) plants which people have labelled 'Sweet Afton Splash', which may or may not be mutations of Sweet Afton, but these so-called 'Sweet Afton Splash' flowers don't look anything like 'Sweet Afton'. The lip in particular. I'll ask the previous owner about where he acquired this plant - get some history if possible.

I previously didn't have any suspicions about this particular plant due to noticeable resemblance of the lip when compared with 'Sweet Afton'. But Roy reckons it's one of the results of a selfing. Plausible. But I don't know that for sure.

I'll do some asking. I don't mind results of a selfing of Sweet Afton. I've mainly been chasing the greenish colour of the tepals - with a lip that resembles more-or-less the awarded 'Sweet Afton' shape, with similar pattern/colouring on the lip.

I've got a few big plants of 'Sweet Afton' ------ acquired from a well-known nursery that was using them for hybridising with other kinds of plants. Waiting for them to flower ----- with hopes that at least one will have flowers close to what I'm looking for. I initially had 4 of these 'Sweet Afton' plants (not the 'mutation' one or suspected 'selfing' one) purchased just last year --- and gave 1 away (as a token of appreciation) to the person that eventually led me to the 'right' connection.

I sent a message off just moments ago to the previous owner (of the plant in the photo). I'll let you know about any answer(s) I get. Thanks Ray!

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by Roy

This is a "Selfing" of Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton'.

I'll look into the possibility of this. In the past, I was trying to get in touch with Bruce (ie. Bruce Ah Sing), who surprisingly turns out to live in Australia - somewhere, who definitely has 'Sweet Afton'. But looks like he's no longer active in any forums. I'd be super keen to purchase a division from him if that is even possible. I initially thought he lived outside of Australia. Bruce Ah Sing has previously posted in orchidboard forum, as well as other forums.

His flower is still seen at : click here. He certainly has Sweet Afton.

I also noticed that Ron-NY and Dorsetman also have it. Excellent specimens.

That particular thread was started by Brutal Dreamer. However, Brutal Dreamer's plant is not 'Sweet Afton'. Brutal Dreamer's flower has consistently the wrong shape lip ----- and I also don't believe that culture and growing environment is going to activate something that causes prominent toothy serrated edges to be formed all around the lip rim of a 'Sweet Afton'. Those serrated edges can be seen in Brutal Dreamer's flower. But - even so - there is consistently significant discrepancy in lip shape between his flowers and the ones of 'Sweet Afton'.

When taking a look at every single awarded Sweet Afton (around the world), and when we take a look at Bruce Ah Sing's flower, and Ron-NY's and Dorsetman's flowers ----- they all look like the previously awarded Sweet Afton flowers. These plants are in different parts of the world, and all pretty much look the same - and that is good.

On the other hand, Brutal Dreamer's flowers are consistently different - because his plant is not 'Sweet Afton'. And one reason for my commenting on Brutal Dreamer's plant - is because he appears to have ignored (deliberately) Bruce Ah Sing's reasonable and accurate remarks.

[Roy]

The one thing you will need to keep in mind. 'Sweet Afton' never mericloned well. One in 10 or 20 plants flowered well. It was then selfed which produced rubbish with one or two a bit better, ie. the one you posted being one of those. This in turn was mericloned & one in 50 plants were good enough to keep. I looked back at the discussion with BD & I think it says all on the subject for a proper 'Sweet Afton'

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by Roy

The one thing you will need to keep in mind. 'Sweet Afton' never mericloned well. One in 10 or 20 plants flowered well. It was then selfed which produced rubbish with one or two a bit better, ie. the one you posted being one of those. This in turn was mericloned & one in 50 plants were good enough to keep. I looked back at the discussion with BD & I think it says all on the subject for a proper 'Sweet Afton'

Thanks. I'll keep that in mind. I've had extensive discussions with people within AOS about that kind of thing, and have even collected scans of film camera photos of 'Sweet Afton' from members ----- all looking just as expected - like 'Sweet Afton'.

I mentioned in my posts (earlier) about the large amount of repeated mericloning, and repeated mericloning of mericlones that occurred. Mutation due to mericloning processes did occur, so mutated plants are not Sweet Afton. Results of selfing's are not Sweet Afton. If it does turn out (after I find out) that my plant is the result of a selfing, then I'm happy to just call it Rlc. Memoria Helen Brown. I'll be absolutely happy with that. I tried to get in touch with Bruce Ah Sing ----- to increase my chances of gaining a 'Sweet Afton' flower - or one that looks as close to classic form as I can get.

The nice thing is that the 'Sweet Afton' plants at least did make it to Australia, and at least one received an AOC award.

Bruce Ah Sing, Ron-NY and Dorsetman certainly have 'Sweet Afton'. The words 'proper' and 'true-form' Sweet Afton is kind of like an over-kill on the description ----- because 'Sweet Afton' refers to plants with exact DNA match-up with the very original 'Sweet Afton'. Any plant that hasn't got identical DNA match-up (including mutations etc) is not 'Sweet Afton'. I know that you know this already. And we both know that Brutal Dreamer's plant is not Sweet Afton.

Brutal Dreamer should have done some cross-checks and verification (photos, chat to AOS etc) before wrongly putting a photo of a flower in his book 'Orchids Through Our Eyes' under the label of Blc. Memoria Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton' AM/AOS. Surprised that he doesn't ever mention that his flower looks nothing like Bruce Ah Sing's, Ron-NY's and Dorsetman's flowers --- and all Sweet Afton's that were ever awarded. I'm sure that he knows it though. It is interesting in that Brutal Dreamer ignores all posts that questions the ID of his flower/plant.

I prefer not to call any plants 'rubbish' - regardless of their form or appearance. It's not their fault that they were cloned/mericloned/grown/introduced etc. It's us humans that did it. I know what you mean though ----- as you're referring to plants that don't meet a breeder's expectations or bench-mark levels. Maybe the breeding contingent has a benign word for those plants that they consider below expectations ..... eg. use a codeword such 'b plants' or 'b grade plants'.

Originally Posted by Roy

I looked back at the discussion with BD & I think it says all on the subject for a proper 'Sweet Afton'

Totally agree with you on that one Roy. And Brutal Dreamer should have addressed Bruce Ah Sing's comments - rather than deliberately ignore him.

[SouthPark]

Hi Ray! I only just got a reply from the previous owner. He told me there's uncertainty in the origin. He acquired the plant from someone no longer with us anymore, sadly. But that's ok ----- totally understanding of it. What I'm going to do is to just label this as Rlc. Memoria Helen Brown.

The previous owner also gave me very good news. He located a confirmed Sweet Afton. I will receive it in our spring time - just around the corner.

As for the splash petal situation ----- this isn't the end of it, as I have two other plants - mature sized (purchased from yet another well-known grower - and very nice guy) that have labels of Rlc. Memoria Helen Brown 'Sweet Afton' svar Splash, reported to be mutations of Sweet Afton with splash petals. Now, I did question the meaning of 'svar' due to this naming being out-of-place, as this sort of naming is for species plants obviously. Whatever the case is here ... that grower (orchid nursery owner) told me that the plants mutated from Sweet Afton and will have splash petals. Will be looking forward to seeing the flowers from those two 'splash' plants. Some nice surprises to be expected - fingers crossed!

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by Roy

'Sweet Afton' never mericloned well. One in 10 or 20 plants flowered well.

Roy ----- one question is --- what does the above suggest? Does it suggest that the majority of the plants that resulted from mericloning became mutated? That is, the majority of those mericlone (results of the mericlone procedure) plants didn't have DNA identical to Sweet Afton (and therefore the majority of those plants were not Sweet Afton)? If so, then what's the mechanism behind that? I had assumed that mericloning in general would produce plants having DNA identical to the original plant. In general.

Or do you mean that production went out of control - where labs began to clone mutants and selfings (and therefore not really mericloning Sweet Afton)?

[Roy]

What it means is that there were a minute amount of Sweet Afton x self plants ie, may 2 or 3 that I know of that were ever seen. One, probably the one you posted is the only mutation of the lot, not sure. I have seen one that looked similar to Sweet Afton but not a good flower. The selfing, like nearly ALL HYBRID selfings produce Rubbish in the seedlings. It is also a plant that didn't like being cloned or it was the way or who or both did the original cloning. This plant is TOO old to really consider looking for or really keep growing IMO. There are way better plants available these days that grow & flower much better also. Sentiment is ok but not to the extent of trying to grow difficult & crap plants in the end. I would love to have my 1st plant (m/clone) of the original, was as good as in every way & Very experienced Catt grower said so also. I don't have in now & I'm not going to get another plant. No time for it.