Subject: what plants can be cloned?

From: [email-masked] (Student at SCSU)
Date: 28 Apr 1996 19:36:57 GMT

I'm wondering what plants can be cloned?  What procedures are used?  
and is it possible to do the procedure outside of a lab? please help 
with references to sources of information and any help that can be 
provided.

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From: [email-masked] (mel turner)
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 1996 20:05:40

>with references to sources of information and any help that can be 

Well, strictly speaking,  nearly all propagation of plants without the use of 
seeds or spores involves cloning.  Plants produced naturally or artificially  
by vegetative propagation involving runners, root sprouts,  bulbils, 
divisions, cuttings, layerings, etc. etc. are all clones of the original 
plant; so are the scions of grafted & budded plants.  Even the seedlings and 
sporelings of apomictic plants [like dandelions] are "cloned".   So  cloning 
of plants is nothing new in nature or in horticulture, and the number of types 
that can be "cloned" is enormous.   

"High-tech",  _in vitro_  cloning methods have been added relatively recently, 
and have been done for various different types of plants.  No doubt some of 
these tissue-culture type methods can be done fairly simply, with a certain 
amount of materials & equipment.   Sterile glass containers,  specific 
nutrient media, perhaps mechanical flask rotators, shaker baths, etc. might be 
involved.   Some plants are propagated and grown from apical meristem tissue; 
some can be grown from single cells.

Of course, growing a piece of potato or an african violet leaf is a 
simpler demonstration of home cloning... ;-)
mdt

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From: [email-masked] (Arthur Evans)
Date: Wed, 01 May 1996 13:21:11 -0700

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked]

> with references to sources of information and any help that can be 

I'm not sure what you're looking for here, but if you're just looking
for a way to grow new plants that are genetically identical to an original
plant, you can grow many species by taking root, stem, or leaf cuttings
and rooting them. This is pretty simple, and you can do it in the comfort
of your own home. You can find instructions in a reasonably comprehensive
gardening book, and you can probably find the materials you'll need at
your local garden store. You'll need a rooting medium (sand, for instance),
some pots, some plastic bags. Probably also some rooting hormone, depending
on what kind of cuttings you're doing.

Rooting a stem cutting goes something like this: Cut a five-inch piece from 
the growing tip of a stem, carefully remove the leaves from the lower half,
dip the end in rooting hormone, and stick it into a pot full of damp potting
medium. Put the pot in a plastic bag, blow some air into the bag, and tie it
off with a rubber band or something (this helps keep your cutting from drying
out). Then you sit back and let the plant do the rest.

All in all, it's pretty easy.  

On the other hand, if what you're looking for a way of growing plants out 
>from  single cells--well, you're on your own ;-).

OK
-ae-