December 13, 2010 by
RickCosta Rica is famous for Arabica Coffee and the coffee plants are easy to spot in most areas outside the capital city of San Jose. Tourism tops their economic resource base and they are in an economic crisis with the world wide recession, the rise of their currency and decline of international travel. The ornamental plant and seed business is thriving and employs over 10000 people there. We visited 6 farms we do business with through plant brokers. Videos and images here feature Pan American Seed Company and Ball Floraplant which are part of Ball Seed Company based in Chicago. Our tour was hosted by Express Seed Company and this is the group photo.
Filmed at Linda Vista, Cartago Costa Rica, home of Ball Seed Companies Pan American Seed Company. Mario Guillen explains the plant breeding process and how they develop inbred lines so they can make F1 hybrid seeds that produce identical seedlings with outstanding characteristics. This has been a 20 year process to develop the Devine Impatiens series.
Plant Breeding Process at PanAmerican Seed Company Linda Vista Sa in Costa Rica
Selecting desirable plants for F1 hybrid breeding in New Guinea Impatiens
Pollination, harvesting and evaluating potential F1 Hybrid Devine New Guinea Impatiens
Several years from now there may be a yellow sun tolerant New Guinea Impatiens available from seed.
Nearby in Cartago is Ball Floraplant where they produce cutting varieties of plants that are not currently possible to reproduce by developing F1 hybrids like the Black Velvet Petunia and Voltage Yellow Osteospermum. These are the Black Velvet stock plants where they harvest cuttings for the world market.
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