I normally only bump a thread if absolutely necessary but I'm compelled to do so in this case...
John W may have well had his own valid reasons for being vague about the real origins of the nice BVT X arb hybrid discussed starting here:
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=7807&start=270But I have my own valid reasons for wanting complete information to be available for everyone! Information wants to be free! The hybrid is called 'Joseph Brueckner' and was discussed already on the yahoo rhodo group in Sept. 2016.
http://www.hirsutum.info/rhododendron/h ... B&id=20583It would really be a bit silly for me to try to keep a secret when there's already a hirsutum page for it. I made enquiries with, shall we say, the 'current stakeholders' of this cultivar. They seemed curiously and risibly panicked that someone out there in the intertubes was implying that this cultivar was not doing well, and perhaps at risk of being lost. (And even worse, perhaps disparaging their climatic conditions!) I was assured it is in no danger of being lost, and is now being tested in various places, even outwith North America. This much is commendable. Alas, turns out I am not an important enough horticulturalist to get a cutting in the foreseeable future. (in retrospect, should I have let them stay panicked?) Upsetting, but would be far more upsetting to think of it being lost. Especially these days, there's plenty of worry to go around concerning the possibility of cultivars being completely lost in the western hemisphere - like all of the old English hybrids at the former Sonoma Horticultural Nursery! I rank my own woes about trying to obtain various cultivars much lower.
So hopefully in a few years it will be more widely available. I think the original hybridizer got a least a bit lucky, I don't think the plurality of seedlings are going to have such a nicely shaped, bicolored truss. It's safe to assume he didn't grow out 30 of them until they flowered...