Rare plants, flowers and seeds including many exotic plants are difficult to find in local garden centers and nurseries for a number of reasons.
Rare plants are rare for one or two reasons, some are just very rare, perhaps almost extinct in nature and the only source of new plant material is help by collectors. Other plants are just 'difficult' to propagate, some fig trees for example need to be pollinated by a wasp from New Guinea to produce seed... the only other option is aerial layering a slow and difficult procedure.
Some plants are easy to reproduce using tissue culture, other are temperamental and will only grow fromm seed, and some bulbs take seven years to flower from seed... so they are 'rare plants'.
Yes rare plants can seem to be expensive, however when you take into account the time and skill involved in growing them, maybe rare plants are actually very cheap...... |