Plant Tissue Culture Project

Every day we lose 100 plant and animal species to deforestation.  Palm oil plantations, timber cutting, and development are destroying jungles and forests at an incredible rate.  Destruction has left us with only 1/3 of Earth’s forests.  Plants are not like animals that can move around during deforestation.

Cultivated plants would be available to hobbyists and collectors.

Biotope One is beginning a Plant Tissue Culture Program to bring plants into cultivation.  Many endemic plants are not scientifically described or even cultivated.  Plant hunters also collect many wild plants to sell.  Tissue Culturing plants would reduce wild collecting. Cultivated plants would be available to hobbyists and collectors.  We are already seeing bucephalandra, a common aquarium plant, getting harder and harder to find in the wild.

Plant Tissue Culture, also known as micropropagation, involves taking a small amount of plant tissue and growing it in a sterile environment.  The plants are manipulated causing them to grow and multiply easily.  One plant can exponentially turn into thousands of plants in a short amount of time.

Bringing the cost of these plants down significantly would reduce or stop collecting in the wild.

Plant species disappear faster than they can be saved.  Natural habitat is also being poached or over collected.  Many plants do not have any protections against them.  Tissue Culture would provide a safety net in the wild and provide a resource for hobbyists to obtain plants from instead of wild collected plants.  Bringing the cost of these plants down significantly would reduce or stop collecting in the wild.

Every day we lose 100 plant and animal species to deforestation.

Biotope One has begun acquiring the materials needed for Plant Tissue Culture.  It is our intent to start with several cryptocorynes, bucephalandra, and eriocaulons.  After the pants have been successfully initiated into jars of media they will be multiplied.  Multiplying involves splitting up old containers into multiple new containers.  When sufficient vessels are made it is possible to grow them out emersed or pass them along to hobbyists.  Everything is done indoors, on shelves, with lights.  No snails, pests, or diseases.

Hobbyists, aquascapers, collectors, and other Plant Tissue Culture individuals are welcome to engage us about the project.  If you have any questions or comment please feel free to let me or one of the other team members know.

If you have any questions or comment please feel free to let me or one of the other team members know.