Impatiens plant -- Chickasaw

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Patent expired June 6, 1995. This plant is in the public domain — anyone may propagate and sell it.

Twenty years from the filing date would end on March 28, 1997, but this patent ends 661 days earlier — a terminal disclaimer gives term back. A source that calculates twenty years from filing would tell you this plant is still protected when it is already free.

The record

Patent number

PP4260

Filed

March 28, 1977

Granted

June 6, 1978

Expires

June 6, 1995

Inventor

RYAN JOHN J

No cultivar name of record

This patent does not name the plant, and for its era that is ordinary rather than an omission. Before about 1980, breeders frequently patented a plant without giving it a cultivar name at all — the grant identified it by its number, its parentage and a written description of the flower and foliage. Most plant patents from the 1930s to the 1970s have no name in them.

Nothing here is missing from our records: the patent itself states no name. Where one exists we show it, and we do not invent one.

Abstract

This invention relates to a new and distinct variety of New Guinea Impatiens plant known by the cultivar name Chickasaw, and discovered by me in commercial greenhouses in Fremont, Calif. Chickasaw is closest in characteristics to Longwood's Painted Lady but is particularly characterized by short internodes; its floriferousness of rose-pink flowers in the summer and salmon flowers in the winter as opposed to Painted Lady whose color is not as dark; a bright yellow variegation on a moderately light green leaf under high light and increasing age of plant as opposed to Painted Lady which has no variegation; and a stem and breaking action conducive to making a good basket plant.

Show the legal claimThe single numbered claim as granted — the legal text that defines what this patent covers.

I claim: 1. A new and distinct form of Impatiens plant as described and illustrated known by the cultivar name Chickasaw and particularly characterized by short internodes; many rose-pink flowers in the summer and salmon flowers in the winter; a bright yellow variegation on a moderately light green leaf under high light and increasing age of plants; and a stem and breaking action conducive to making a good basket.

Read the full patent: US Plant Patent PP4260 in full — the complete specification, every figure, and the file history.