Transcript AOS Description Writing Guidelines

Award
Descriptions
- Designed
with the
mind’s eye - in
mind
Ron McHatton
April 2015
Why write descriptions at all when we have images?
What if the image looks like
this?
Or this?
Or this?
How many errors can you find in this description?
Well grown plant has twelve pseudobulbs with three 25-cm.
leaves each and one hundred and three flowers and fifty four
buds on three branched, arching inflorescences up to 100cm
long well held above foliage in a 10 inch pot. Flowers yellow,
sepals have purplish stripping, petals basal one third with
purple blotching; lip red; callus purple; column and 5 cm spur
white; texture firm, substance matte. Commended for color
combination which judges thought was striking.
I think I find 31
ALL descriptions follow a prescribed format
it is NOT the order in which the measurements are taken.
1. Flowers, buds, number of inflorescences
2. Description of plant and container if appropriate
3. Flower base color if appropriate
4. Dorsal sepal (or sepals if taken together)
5. Lateral sepals (or SYNSEPAL) if not included with dorsal sepal
6. Petals
7. Lip including crests, keels and spur
8. Column and anther cap (or staminode)
9. Substance
10. Texture
11. Ovary if noteworthy
12. Floral bracts if noteworthy
13. Rachis is noteworthy
14. Country of origin for botanical awards
15. Verification of identity
16. Any judges comments of note, i.e., ….precluded higher score
Descriptions have one capital letter – the first one
the exception is if proper nouns are included like …….cultivar
dominated by Cattleya parent.
and only one period – at the very end.
The description of plant or flower parts are separated by semi-colons
sepals green; petals yellow; lip white
Thoughts related to the description of a single segment are separated by
commas
sepals green, blotched maroon;
sepals and petals white, petal apices flared magenta;
Taking parts together is fine if it’s appropriate
sepals chartreuse, striped mahogany, synsepal less densely
First, ALL descriptions of awards involving plants with flowers
start with the number of flowers, buds and inflorescences.
Unopened or immature inflorescences are included in
the count.
Err on the side of more information than less
i.e., Sixty-four flowers on one branched
inflorescence, 53 buds on a second inflorescence
and 3 buds on an additional immature
inflorescence
is of much more value to subsequent judges than
Sixty-four flowers and 56 buds on 3
inflorescences
The first case lets the reader know that 64 on an
inflorescence is possible. The latter is 40 per infl.
Use of descriptive qualifiers
In my opinion not used enough –
This is your opportunity to say why you awarded
something – but make sure the words match the
numbers
Three remarkable, flat flowers…..
Five brilliantly colored, eye-catching, flat
flowers on a sharply erect, impressive
inflorescence……………………
Four striking, dramatic flowers………
Sepals and petal electric green
Form modifiers – almost never enough
flowers
full, cupped, cernuate (nodding),
campanulate (bell-like), flat, open or stellate,
etc.
petals porrect, reflexed, inrolled, fused
lip at 90 degrees to floral plane
margins
smooth, crisped, undulate, feathered,
fimbriate or fringed, ruffled, dentate, warted
surfaces
smooth, papilose, scurfid (scaly), pubescent,
hairy
A word (or two or three) about hairs
Canescent
Pubescent
Ciliate
Sericeous
Floccose warts
These petals are not
goffered – they are
undulate or wavy
Old-style postage
stamps in sheets have
goffered edges
Goffered edge face-on
Goffering viewed edgeon
Develop the habit to describe flowers consistently
if you describe the sepals and petals in layers beginning with base
color and work out from the colum and add layers, i.e.,
Sepal and petal base color white overlaid
soft pink, proximally peppered darker pink,
medially spotted rose-pink, apically flared dark rosepink
then follow the same order for the lip
lip white, distally overlaid lavender veined
purple
Means something quite different from
lip white veined purple, distally overlaid
lavender
or
lip white, proximally veined purple, distally
overlaid lavender
What’s that in the road, a head? Or What’s that in the road
ahead?
Avoid descriptors that are ambiguous without a picture. Which is correct?
petal upper halves coarsely spotted brown-maroon, lower halves less spotted
petal proximal superior halves coarsely spotted maroon, inferior halves less spotted
Distal
Medial
apex
Basal
Proximal
Central
Superior
Inferior
Substance:
This is what you feel
firm, heavy, thin, tissue-paper, rigid
what does average mean?
Texture:
This is what you see
crystalline, satiny, waxy, matte, scurfy
Describe the majority first, then the exception
texture crystalline, lip waxy.
Numbers
The first number at the beginning of the description is written as
such
Fifty-four flowers vs. 54 Flowers
other numbers in the text
numbers less than 11 are written out - eleven
11 and higher are written as numbers
the exception to the rule is measurements
all measurements are written as numbers
7-cm or 13cm not seven-cm
measurements expressed as adjectives are hyphenated
103-cm inflorescence
5.7-cm spur
if the measurement follows the noun, there is no hyphen
on six inflorescences to 103cm long
on three inflorescences of 110cm average length
Colors
One of the single biggest sources of confusion in descriptions
two colors, one of which modifies the other are hyphenated
yellow-green, red-brown
fruit and vegetable colors are acceptable and are not hyphenated
lemon yellow, lime green, apple green, grass green
Rose ANYTHING is always hyphenated since ROSE is a color that modifies the
other
Raspberry is NOT a color, it should be raspberry pink or raspberry red, etc.
The debate still continues whether cream is a color – if not it should be
cream-color
Do not use –ish as in greenish-yellow
if you mean that use chartreuse or green-yellow
Use of –y is acceptable and is not hypenated
creamy yellow
Be very careful of ambiguous combinations
rust red – do you mean rust-colored or a color that is rusty red?
This is NOT a green flower…………
To say flowers green; lip yellow is incorrect
It should be sepals and petals green; lip
yellow,……
In a similar fashion, the flower to the right
shouldn’t be described as
flowers red; lip yellow…….
But
sepals and petals red; lip yellow, distally
splashed red, side margins darker yellow;
These flowers aren’t concolor white
Flower base color clear, uniform white; lip side lobes proximally bright
yellow;
This flower is not pristine white. Pristine white
implies pure, unblemished.
Sparkling, bright, clear are all better
descriptors.
Apical flares
vs.
distal flares
Well grown plant has twelve pseudobulbs with
three 25-cm. leaves each and one hundred and
three flowers and fifty four buds on three
branched, arching inflorescences up to 100cm
long well held above foliage in a 10 inch pot.
Flowers yellow, sepals have purplish stripping,
petals basal one third with purple blotching; lip
red; callus purple; column and 5 cm spur white;
texture firm, substance matte. Commended for
color combination which judges thought was
striking.
One hundred three flowers and 54 buds
well-held above foliage on three branched,
arched inflorescences to 100cm long
produced on a well-grown, 12-pseudobulb
plant grown in a 25-cm pot; leaves, three
per pseudobulb, 25cm long; sepals and
petals yellow, sepals striped purple, petal
proximal one-third blotched purple; lip red,
callus purple, 5-cm spur white; column
white; substance firm; texture matte;
commended for striking color combination.