The real deal

With an eye for color, flower form and plant habit, breeder Richard Read of U.K.-based Realflor has introduced game-changing selections of Gaillardia and Leucanthemum.

Read, who has decades of growing and garden retail experience, said it was “pure luck” that led him to a gaillardia sport in someone’s garden. This serendipitous discovery would eventually become Gaillardia ‘Fanfare.’

‘Fanfare’ was a stand out among the other gaillardias on the market because of its tubed petals. By 2003, ‘Fanfare’ had won Best New Plant in the U.K.

“At that stage, I knew we had some hot property,” Read recalls.

In 2004, Read met with Geoff Needham of PlantHaven to introduce the selection in the United States.

“It was also excellent luck that I’d known Geoff from our previous links in horticulture, and that he was able to help us introduce ‘Fanfare’ in the states,” says Read. “We generated huge sales in the states immediately. We couldn’t produce enough of them.”

As a follow-up to the successful launch of ‘Fanfare,’ the Realflor team began breeding gaillardias for hardiness, compactness, and a wider color range.

“We were the first company in the world to produce a pink gaillardia,” he says.

Since the debut of ‘Fanfare,’ Realflor has added three more selections to the line including ‘Fanfare Blaze,’ ‘Fanfare Regal,’ and ‘Fanfare Citronella.’

Other gaillardias from Realflor include ‘Celebration’ and several selections in its Sunset collection.

Read also selects gaillardias for different color tubes, and ease of propagation.

“Gaillardias are often difficult to take cuttings from and root,” he says. “But ‘Celebration’ roots as well as a chrysanthemum.”
 

A new effort

With the success of the gaillardias, PlantHaven’s Needham suggested the Read and his team try a new crop.

“We thought about the family Compositae, and decided on the genus Leucanthemum,” Read says. “A great breeder from California, Luther Burbank, had bred L. superbum. It was a hardy, herbaceous plant that kept its color for some time. We knew that Leucanthemum was fairly close genetically to the chrysanthemum, of which we had a lot more knowledge of breeding.”

And in 2008, Read convinced his friend Keith Lintott to join him at Realflor. Lintott had been breeding chrysanthemums for 30 years. Lintott died in October of this year, but his breeding work will carry on.

“We lost a great horticulturist and a dear friend,” Read says.

Read and Lintott hand-pollinated more than 5,000 Shasta daisy plants and have made more than 35,000 selections during the past seven years. This meticulous breeding and selection process has resulted in plant characteristics never before seen in this species, such as flower form (pom flowers and double flowers) and plant height.

The “Real” collection of Leucanthemums highlights distinctly different varieties with unique flowers. All have a sturdy, upright habit that needs no staking, and all are well branched, producing a great canopy of blossoms. These varieties are very floriferous with improved disease resistance. All bloom early- to mid-summer and then repeat bloom in fall. The plants’ refined, narrow foliage helps increase the heat and drought tolerance of these selections.

Currently, Read is making selections for an early-flowering variety, which he expects to be on the market in the next year or two. He’s also selecting for disease resistance.

For all of Realflor’s introductions, once the final selections are made, they go through tissue culture to ensure clean material is going out to the market, Read says.
 

For more: www.realflorusa.com