On 2009-05-11 10:03:49 +0100, gogo said:

Sacha wrote:
On 2009-05-10 11:20:08 +0100, "BOFH" said:


"Alan" wrote in message
...

It make s a refreshing change from assuming that everyone still
communicates in Latin.

Sorry, I disagree with that point. The latin bits fine by me

It's essential if you want to be sure you're getting the plant you
think you want. After that you can call it 'Fred' if you want to.

Also, if English is not your mother tongue, it makes it easier to make
the connection between the English and French (in my case) common names.

That's exactly it. We had some French customers who came in a few
years ago asking for 'sauges'. Nobody on the staff speaks French so I
was asked to help. It took me seconds to go from sauges to sages to
Salvias and they were very relieved! But if they'd said Salvias, the
member of the Nursery staff serving them would have got it straight
away. This is a very minor example, obviously but it does show that if
you ask for Mimosa in some parts of USA you'll either get a mixture of
champagne and orange juice or an Albizia julibrissin. What you won't
get is 'English' mimosa, which is Acacia and usually A. dealbata. The
other incident of that sort was again with some English customers who'd
been on holiday in France and were asking our staff for what they'd
been told were 'ortensia'. I don't know how it was they hadn't
recognised Hydrangeas in France but until my 'French memory' kicked in,
nobody had associated hortensia with Hydrangea

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Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.com
Exotic plants, shrubs & perennials
South Devon