In different times, we would have been in London now for Mark to attend a special presentation. He has been awarded the RHS Veitch Memorial Medal although I don’t expect many people in this part of the world to understand just how big that honour is.
The Veitch is the highest honour Britain’s prestigious Royal Horticultural Society award to people who are not citizens of that country. It is also the highest international honour we know of in our field – a literal medal that is gold in colour but I rather doubt that it is made of gold. I draw a comparison to the medals earned by sportspeople when they win a world championship. For us, the honour is in that league.
We have known for about two months that Mark is one of this year’s recipients but were asked to keep it quiet until after the presentation ceremony in London yesterday. They usually award about four Veitch medals a year, covering the globe. For us, it is doubly special because Mark’s father, Felix, was awarded it in 1992 and this is one of the very (very) few times, that two generations from one family have received it. I still remember Felix’s quiet pride to be honoured internationally for his work in plant breeding.
I trawled the list of recipients down the years and oh my, but the company is very elevated internationally. As far as I could see, Mark is the thirteenth New Zealander to have been honoured since its inception in 1870, of whom only three others are still alive (Alan Jellyman, Keith Hammett and Bev McConnell).
For Mark, it is even more of an honour to have been nominated by international colleagues. Last year alone, over 425 000 of his cultivars grown under licence were sold internationally. This does not include production and sales of plants he has bred but we did not retain ownership rights over.
Our thanks go to Anthony Tesselaar Plants, our Australian-based agents, who have had the role of managing Mark’s cultivars on the international market over many years and who have always acted in his best interests.
In the manner of magazine writers these days, I interviewed Mark with quickfire questions on his plants. Well, to put it more accurately, as we sat having an afternoon cup of tea, I double-checked my preconceptions.
Favourite magnolia you have bred: Magnolia ‘Felix Jury’. (Named for his father because it was what Felix was trying to get to in his earlier generation of breeding).
Favourite rhododendron: ‘Floral Sun’. (To quote Mark from an earlier time when he was unusually extravagant in his assessment or maybe had been drinking wine, “If I never breed anything as lovely as that again, I will die happy.”
Favourite vireya rhododendron: ‘Pink Jazz’ (which is why it is named for our first-born child in an oblique sort of way).
Favourite camellia: ‘Fairy Blush’ (known here as the one that got away from us in terms of retaining ownership rights. It was the very first plant of his own breeding that Mark named and released on the open market).
Favourite michelia: “RFA,” he replied. “Room for improvement”. The michelias are on ongoing project at this stage, but of those already released, he named ‘Fairy Magnolia Blush’ because it is the first to bring colour into the range.
Biggest surprise: Daphne ‘Perfume Princess’.
It is not so much a red letter day here as a gold medal day and that does not happen often.
Tikorangi The Jury Garden 
Hearty congratulations to a most worthy recipient. Great news.
Thanks, Vaughan. We are pretty excited. Well, I am. Mark is more low-key pleased and humbled, as is his way.
Magnificent achievement and very much deserved.Hearty congratulations Mark. I have four of his six favourites and,all such healthy and strong producers of flowers.Felix is a standout with its huge “dinner plate” size flowers.
Well done Mark !!!!
Thanks, Mike. Felix sure is a standout in our eyes, too.
Congratulations Mark, so well deserved. Our gardens are so much better for the quality work you have done. Thank you.
Congratulations, Mark! Very well deserved for your magnificent Magnolias alone, and then there are the Rhododendrons and Camelias too!
Congratulations Mark.
I am very grateful for your creations and love of plants.
Our landscapes will be forever enhanced!
Thanks, Tony Murrell. We appreciate your support. XXX
Wow, so awesome to read about your work. Huge congratulations!
Dear Abbie, What a wonderful award! I think it is so much more than a âGoldâ medal in an athletes life, often that is for one special event in their career that they have worked very hard for. For this âGoldâ it is a celebration of many beautiful events of each lovely plant that you have bred that are celebrated all over the world with out the clamour and noise of an athlete, this âGoldâ will be celebrated with quiet pleasure and joy of your plants now and after your life time by gardeners all over the world. I think it is the ultimate success of so many years of hard work, hours of work and the belief in yourself that you are creating plants that are not only beautiful but are tough, relaible in so many places and that will bring people the joy I feel when I look out the window and see âIolantheâ in bloom despite the 100 km wind and a couple of -!0C frosts. It is also the fact people will know when they buy any of the Jury plants they are buying a reliable, tough plant that will fill them with pleasure all their lives. So this is a life time award celebrating Marks work and his fathers and also yours, Abbie; anyone who achieves such an award always has someone who is their biggest fan and who supports them thru success and disappointment. Well done for you both on this wonderful acknowlegment of a life times work, thank you for the wonerful plants you have given to the world Marianne
Sent from Mail for Windows
Thanks, Marianne. I have printed off your comments for Mark to enjoy. He may be a whizzy plant breeder but he is a technological dinosaur. And yes, there is longevity in both Felix and Mark’s work that brings much pleasure to so many other people.
This just brings a smile to the face and a warm glow. Just terrific.
We are feeling very happy here today!
This is an honour, indeed. Congratulations!
Thanks, Pat. It is a very public endorsement of 40 years of quietly working away in pursuit of goals.
Well done and well to deserved to Mark! A true plants-man. What is coming up next in the release pipeline for his breeding work?
There are three new deciduous magnolias in the pipeline for release (a purple, a red and a huge white) and three new michelias also being built up for international release. So still coming but it takes several years. This is a business that takes great patience.
How exciting your new releases sound! I hope you and Mark will be celebrating in style even though you were unable to attend the awards ceremony
Congratulations Mark on your wonderful achievements
Kind regard
Trish Mackay
Sincere congratulations. Richly deserved.
Thanks, Keith. Appreciated. Now two NZers currently holding it for plant breeding.
Congratulations Mark
Congratulations and well deserved
Congratulations on this well deserved honour.
I regularly use your plants in my planting plans and promote them to my clients.
Great to hear!
Congratulations Mark, what an honour. As a keen horticulturalist myself a gold medal for years of plant breeding, and the legacy that leaves for us all as a whole seems to surpass a sports medal. An inspiration for sure.
Congratulations.well deserved.my previous gardens all have some of your plants,and I always told the new owners to take care of them .
Wonderful!
Thank you Abbie for sharing the wonderful day with us.
Congratulations! What an amazing honour for a lifetime of work and highlighting you as an innovator from way down in New Zealand.
I sure hope this gets some local media attention!
Julia x
What a fantastic honour and extra special when it’s a family affair! Congratulations to Mark.
I loved my Fairy Blush camellia, was sad to leave it at our last house, it was my daughters birth flower.
It makes it feel more special to hear that you regard Fairy Blush as your daughter’s birth flower. Thank you for saying so.
Yes Abbie, some of us do know what an amazing achievement and recognition awarding a Veitch is! Congratulations to both Mark and you and thank you for your dedication to the Aotearoa and international plant world.
Thank you.
Congratulations Mark, I’m delighted for you. A richly deserved award.
Thanks, Val. Mark sends his best wishes.
Congratulations Mark ( and Abby, who must be your right hand woman)
What a well deserved acknowledgment for all your years of work for the benefit of humble gardeners like me
THANKS
That is a very kind comment. Thank you.
Many congratulations to you and Mark —and I love/ am in awe of your work and the outcomes. I took your Michelia x ‘Fairy White’ to RHS Early Spring Show yesterday at RHS Rosemoor in Devon and someone else had brought an even better specimen of it which looked spectacularly beautiful and I think won the class. My plant came through last week’s snow without trouble and flowers here from February right through to the end of May–an amazing plant suffering -10c here without any setback, against a wall. I also took a ‘Fairy Blush’ to the Camellia miniature class which did well. You are an amazing breeder and this Veitch medal is so very well deserved.
Caroline, it is always great to hear how one of Mark’s plants fares well in climates that are so different to ours. I saw photos of ‘Felix Jury’ on the table at the Rosemoor show but not Fairy White. Thank you for your kind comments.