Chris Ghyselen's plant breeding 'career' started simply as a sideline to obtain varieties for his own garden designs. But with international interest being kindled for his introductions, we can hope that this activity will start to become a bigger part of his agenda.

Carefully selected Brunnera specimens are planted together and left to 'play', in Chris's words!

As you may expect from a man with such respect for nature, Chris doesn't interfere too much in the natural breeding process. He confines his role to one of 'matchmaker', placing carefully chosen specimens next to each other in order to influence the qualities of the resulting seedlings. From these, he will select plants that display interesting new qualities and use them to repeat the process.

It sounds all so easy, yet still takes a trained eye for plant qualities, plus green fingers (or thumb, depending where in the world you live!) to achive desirable results.

Chris likes to get close to his Brunneras and join in the fun!

When asked about how he feels about plant breeding, Chris Ghyselen’s reaction still brings out an expression of wonder and pride delivered with the refreshing enthusiasm of a young child. “Discovering new varieties makes me feel as I did when I was a young boy playing in the fields, yet being the person to bring these new plants into the world makes me feel like a man!”

Despite the diversity of genera he has to choose from, Chris concentrates his breeding efforts almost exclusively on Brunnera and Persicaria. But the door for others is always open, as he continually scans the garden for and unexpected seedlings that emerge.

A new Geranium in the making? Chris is keeping an eye on this one because although its leaf patterning reminds one of G. phaeum, he thinks this is likely to be derived from G. oxianum.

You can read albout the Brunneras and Persicarias Chris has bred by clicking on the stories "The Brunnera Collection" and "The Persicaria Collection" in the right hand column of this page.