Memorial Trust
29 Great Smith Street
London SW1P 3AZ
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Email office@wcmt.org.uk Telephone 0207 799 1660
Facsimile 0207 799 1667
Registered Charity No.313952
Background |
The Fellowship |
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2000 Orchid conservation |
Phil Seaton was awarded a Fellowship in 2000 to learn about the ex situ conservation of orchids in Latin America. He travelled to Cuba, Mexico, Costa Rica and Ecuador over a period of nine weeks, visiting both amateur growers and people working in botanical gardens, universities and commercial nurseries; both teaching and learning more about orchid micropropagation techniques. Although his project was specifically aimed at ex situ conservation, he also took the opportunity to go into the field to see and learn more about orchids growing in their natural habitats in each country. |
The Results |
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At the time of the award Phil was a biology lecturer in a College of Further Education, and had been studying Spanish in his spare time to enable him to travel easily in Latin America. With a long-standing passion for orchids and their conservation (he was awarded the degree of M.Phil in 1985 for his research into the problems of the long-term storage of orchid seeds), Phil took early retirement in 2004 to work with orchids full time. He soon became Secretary of the IUCN Orchid Specialist Group and later a founding member and Trustee of the charity Orchid Conservation International, whose aim is to raise funds for orchid conservation projects. Having been a regular contributor to a number of orchid journals for more than 30 years, an early project was that of writing (and illustrating) Growing Orchids from Seed together with Margaret Ramsay, with the aim of stimulating an interest in orchid culture amongst a wide audience. He is now co-authoring a book about growing hardy (terrestrial) orchids. Phil is presently employed by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, as Project Manager for the Darwin Initiative project Orchid Seed Stores for Sustainable Use (OSSSU). The aim of the project is to establish a global network of orchid seed banks, beginning initially with facilities in 16 different countries in Latin America and Asia. Workshops have been held in Chengdu (China) and Quito (Ecuador) to teach orchid seed storage techniques and exchange ideas and expertise with representatives from participating institutions.. Projects of this nature depend upon the enthusiasm and commitment of its participants, and OSSSU would have been difficult to establish without the many friendships he made during his Fellowship. Phil is regularly invited to speak about orchid conservation at international orchid conferences. It is no exaggeration to say that his Fellowship transformed his life, and has had a positive role in promoting orchid conservation around the world. Linkshttp://www.osssu.org/ www.orchidconservation.org/OSG/ http://orchidconservation.org/ |
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