Does anyone happen to know why Honeyberry USA is making this claim:
The yellow highlighted link goes to this:
Edited: I thought maybe it was because they ship to Canada, but I just checked and they don’t. Why are they under the impression that folks in the USA cannot propagate plants under PBR?
I think you can’t sell them as the named varieties maybe? I think HBU imports some of the plants and pays a royalty to UoS. Like with the sour cherry series. I could be way way way off base tho.
Thanks for your input, @EJh . Plants that have a valid trademark (named varieties) can be propagated, but cannot be sold as the named varieties without a license.
HBU seems to be saying that it is their belief that people living in the USA cannot propagate plants that are protected under the Canadian PBR law. Either that or they are being disingenuous. I don’t know them personally, so, I don’t know which it is.
I actually just asked the AI companion that I use sometimes the question and this was the response:
Q: Does someone in the United States have to follow the Plant Breeders Rights law of Canada?
A: No, someone in the United States does not have to follow the Plant Breeders’ Rights (PBR) law of Canada. The Canadian Plant Breeders’ Rights Act is only applicable within Canada. However, if a plant breeder in the United States wants to protect their plant varieties in Canada, they would need to apply for PBR in Canada. Similarly, Canadian plant breeders must apply for protection in the United States if they want their rights to be recognized there1.
1Link provided: Guide To Plant Breeders’ Rights In Canada - inspection.canada.ca
Basically, exactly what @TheDerek and @DougAtOakSummit indicated.
I am also trying to make sure that I understand patent laws when using seed.
Example: I am allowed to use the maternal seed of Aurora (maternal) x Strawberry Sensation (paternal) but not the paternal seed. Is that correct?
Edited: This is only BU’s website:
I can’t actually find a record for a patent, pending or otherwise, for Strawberry Sensation. I only see a TM. 
@FarmGirl-Z6A It’s a good question, as an aspiring breeder this got me doing some research. There’s a concept in both US and Canadian plant breeders rights (PBR) called Essentially Derived Variety (EDV). You can use patented parents for breeding, but if you just chose one of your seedlings that was exactly like one of the parents, this closes the loophole to keep anyone from just propagating a nearly identical plant and calling it their new variety. To make sure you’ve made something new it should have some noticeable differences, in the size, fruit or the growth habit etc, so your F1 generation needs to be distinct otherwise your new plant can be considered essentially derived. For a backyard gardener this is a complete non issue, but if you want to sell it at a nursery as Straw-aurora-berry etc then you probably want something new and interesting with blend of the traits anyway.
I just realized that I wasn’t really making myself clear above and you may even be asking yourself why I posted the information about UB.
I was under the impression that you can’t use seed from a patent variety, but you can use pollen, thus my example above.
After I posted, I realized that I just took UB’s word for it that Strawberry Sensation is under a patent. I can’t find a patent, I can only find a TM, so I edited my post to include that information.
Furthermore, it is now my belief that you can’t use pollen or seeds, under any circumstance (in the US), from a patented variety without permission.
Since it’s come up here… Regarding whether trademarks on plant names are valid or not, it is very frequent that the claimed trademarks are NOT valid because the trademark holders have not enforced proper protocol. To remain valid, the trademark name must be used along with the cultivar name. The official cultivar name can not be trademarked. If nurseries list the trademark name only, without any cultivar name then that effectively makes the trademark name function as the cultivar name, thereby invalidating it and putting it into the public domain.
There has also been a trend in recent years for plant breeders to officially list their breeder codes as if they are the cultivar name to ensure that they list both the trademark name and cultivar name on labels, while effectively ensuring people will only learn to call it by the trademark name since the listed “cultivar name” (actually just their breeder code) is often an unpronounceable mix of letters and numbers. In these cases, it is also quite likely that the trademarks would not hold up if taken to court since the loophole they have been using effectively introduces the plants to the public as if the trademark name is the cultivar name.
I’ll give a couple examples.
Here is a trademark name that would have a chance of holding up as valid: Sambucus nigra ‘Eva’ Black Lace™ Elderberry. It could hold as valid because it is listed with a cultivar name that is an actual pronounceable word (Eva - the name of a person which the cultivar was named after). However, if multiple nurseries were labeling it as “Black Lace” without actually disclosing the cultivar name as ‘Eva’, then the trademark could become invalid unless the trademark holder actively polices nurseries to call them out if they label it incorrectly.
A cultivar name which would absolutely not be enforceable as valid would be Schizandra chinensis 'Eastern Prince’™ Magnolia Vine. Every nursery which lists it shows ‘Eastern Prince’ as the cultivar name and despite typically listing that it is trademarked, it is never listed with any official cultivar name along with the trademark name. This means that the trademark would absolutely be unenforceable. Intended or not, ‘Eastern Prince’ has by common use become the official cultivar name.
Another example of a trademark name that would likely fail to hold up in court is Delosperma sp. ‘P001S’ Fire Spinner™ Iceplant. Technically, ‘P001S’ is not a breeder code since this was found in the wild and not bred, but it is still in the same category. It’s a collector code assigned to track the original accession found in the wild. While it is common for nurseries to appropriately list ‘P001S’ along with the trademark name “Fire Spinner”, the fact that ‘P001S’ isn’t actually a name, but rather a code means that it CAN’T be a cultivar name. This would invalidate the trademark and make “Fire Spinner” functionally the official cultivar name for this selection.
I hope these examples help you to determine when trademark names are valid and when they are not. We certainly don’t need cultivars getting un-necessarily renamed in an attempt to avoid using trademarked names which weren’t valid trademarks to begin with.
my understanding was that any sexually reproduced plants, regardless of the parents could be used or sold as they are genetically distinct. I havent dug into it deeply because that seems logical. But ive heard that people have gotten into trouble regarding ‘roundup ready’ type seed thats been sexually created, because it contains protected genes. Essentially this stuff is really complicated…
Hi jrd51 did you successfully grow any honeyberries? We also live in Bristol, RI and are looking to grow these.
Sure, I PM’d my phone. Text me and we can set up a time to talk.
Wow that’s … Just a few 
100+?
Hopefully they all root for you !
I didnt really count them, tried to have AI count them for me but it was horrible at it. Thats why I took the end picture specifically. it told me there was only like 57 cuttings total… lol
Was AI giving you a per bundle count rather than a total count. It does look like there are over 50 cuttings in each bundle.
I asked for the total so not sure what the heck it was doing, I should have counted when I bundled them maybe, would be nice to have an estimate of how many there are, but its not a HUGE deal.
I had been using grok, tried again now with Google lense and it gave a better answer…
Generative AI is experimental.
Based on the image and search results, the items in the image are likely grape cuttings. There are approximately 12 bundles of cuttings, with each bundle containing roughly 50-70 individual cuttings. Therefore, a rough estimation would place the total number of hardwood cuttings in the picture between 600 and 840. It is important to note that this is an approximation due to the density and arrangement of the bundles, making an exact count difficult.
I asked for a specific exact number and got this answer…
Generative AI is experimental.
There are 224 visible hardwood cutting ends in the image. The cuttings are bundled together and stacked, making it possible to count the visible ends directly. Each circle represents the end of a single hardwood cutting. By carefully counting each visible end, the total number is determined to be 224.
I don’t know how I totally missed this entire post from you @DougAtOakSummit . Lots of great info. Thanks for posting your protocol for rooting softwood haskap cuttings and that great link!
Do you still wax the tips @TheDerek ?
I am trying fall hardwood and spring hardwood cuttings this season.
The fall batch is under hay and snow as we speak. I am processing my cuttings today to put them on a heat mat.
Good luck!
Ive been spraying them with wilt-pruf lately. IM not sure how much it helps, but it definitely doesnt hurt them to put something on to reduce desiccation while they are callusing I think
Perhaps ask it to show its work so you can see how credible or where it may be breaking down. Like asking how many bundles, number in each bundle, how many are not flush with the end of the bundle in each, that sort of thing.
I stuck a lot of haskap cuttings over the last few days… my first time trying this so not sure how its gonna work out. Fingers crossed.
