Abstract

John Maurice died in July 2002 after 50 years of tree nursery work in Israel. He had a way with plants and it seemed as though no woody species could resist being cloned by him. John had an uncanny feeling for creating a congenial nursery environment under harsh conditions and pioneered the propagation of ‘mini-trees’, including cultivars of a wide range of fruit and nut crops and selected progenies of species used in agroforestry.

Neither poor infrastructure, nor heat or drought would prohibit the movement of mini-trees to remote districts. If necessary the mini-trees could be raised to a conventional size for field planting in a simple nursery within the district. And to make advances in tree crop breeding anywhere in the world available to developing countries, John envisaged an international network for the exchange of mini-trees. John did not live to see these dreams come true, although he demonstrated that his vision was no daydream closer to home: he was asked to establish a nursery in the harsh environment of the Negev desert.

This paper is written as a tribute to John Maurice, in the conviction that his propagation methods deserve wider application, particularly in the Third World. The methods are discussed in some detail and scrutinized according to the tenets of crop science. They are also placed in the context of developments in plant propagation in general. John’s notions about the role of high quality nursery stock in engendering development in the Third World are presented. The operation of national plant quarantine stations and the Asian citrus rehabilitation programme are examples of activities that might benefit greatly from employing mini-trees.

Nurseryman and His Trees by Ed Verheij and Harrie Lövenstein

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