This was posted on the email Robin yesterday, if you have any of John Benz recent daylilies they may only be high priced seedlings and not registered daylilies.
Mr. Benz's website prominently states "AHS Names Pending" so that potential
buyers might think the registration process is underway. Recently, I
checked with the AHS registrar about this. Some of Mr. Benz's 2013
introductions have "reserved names" listed in the database. This does not
mean these seedlings are registered, and those reserved names expire in
2016, meaning that anyone who wants to use those same names to register a
daylily can do so if the names expire before actual registration takes
place. So I wonder how in good conscience the statement "AHS Names
pending" can be used when none of these 2015 introductions have been
submitted for registration. Buyers need to understand that names on
unregistered cultivars are fair game for anyone, as the names are not
protected by registration. Had Mr. Benz attempted to register a seedling as
'Volcanic Explosion' prior to listing it on his site, that name would have
been rejected by the committee and an alternate name would have to have been
selected for that seedling since the name is already taken. As these 2015
introductions are unregistered, these ( until such time that they are
actually registered) cannot be entered into AHS accredited shows, are not
eligible for any AHS awards, nor can they be shown or mentioned in the
Daylily Journal. That is not important to many people, but buyers should be
aware.
AHS strongly encourages hybridizers to register their cultivars before they
are entered into commerce. This is stated on the website and in the
registration guidelines. Regrettably, Mr. Benz has not been in compliance
with AHS registration policy since 2012. He did not register any cultivars
in 2013, 2014, and only one in 2015. The 2015 registration is 'Bighorn',
which is not included on his current website.
One of the reasons that AHS encourages hybridizers to register their
cultivars before they are entered into commerce is so that any such
misleading or confusing name issues will not arise with buyers. Sometimes
the Registrar or Registration Chair or even the President will get irate
emails from people who have purchased daylilies only to find that the names
of the cultivars they purchased are not shown in the AHS database, or that
they have purchased a cultivar with a name that was registered by someone
else 30 or 40 years ago! Members hopefully understand that AHS can do
nothing about hybridizers who choose to sell without registering their
seedlings, other than disallow them to nominate cultivars for awards ( or
the other sanctions listed above) We can only encourage hybridizers to do
the right thing and hope that they will follow through. We sincerely
appreciate that the majority of hybridizers sincerely try their best to
follow AHS guidelines and rules for registering their cultivars prior to
putting them in commerce, and certainly those who do follow the rules are
appreciated by all of their customers, too. Of course, it is the buyers
choice as to whether they buy registered daylilies or not!
