Judging Discussion

[Gcroz]

Not sure how many of you will want to go on record discussing judging issues, but I thought I'd try and start a conversation. Based on the Recent Orchids, and some of the FCC plants pictured there, I thought the topic was ripe. Here are my issues with AOS judging (based on Boylston so experiences may vary):

1. I think parallel awards should be given if the plant deserves the award (Boylston will not give parallel flower awards)!

2. Judges do need to consider there is a pecuniary interest in plants that are awarded.

3. Rather than starting with the plant being crap and working up, judges should start at the plant being 100 pts. and work down!

4. (Not at Boylston) there is an appearance that certain companies and individuals easily get awards, while more worthy plants from lesser known people to not.

Yes, this may come across as "sour grapes" but it is very hard to judge award quality plants when one center screens out a plant and another awards a lesser quality plant, for example the same hybrid.

Curious as to others opinions, ideas, and reflections. Please keep it civil!

 

[Rick]

Not sure how many of you will want to go on record discussing judging issues, but I thought I'd try and start a conversation. Based on the Recent Orchids, and some of the FCC plants pictured there, I thought the topic was ripe. Here are my issues with AOS judging (based on Boylston so experiences may vary):

1. I think parallel awards should be given if the plant deserves the award (Boylston will not give parallel flower awards)!

2. Judges do need to consider there is a pecuniary interest in plants that are awarded.

3. Rather than starting with the plant being crap and working up, judges should start at the plant being 100 pts. and work down!

4. (Not at Boylston) there is an appearance that certain companies and individuals easily get awards, while more worthy plants from lesser known people to not.

Yes, this may come across as "sour grapes" but it is very hard to judge award quality plants when one center screens out a plant and another awards a lesser quality plant, for example the same hybrid.

Curious as to others opinions, ideas, and reflections. Please keep it civil!

For having been on a role for a half a year now:

1) I'm mixed on the idea of parallel awards. It could lead to so many awards that ultimately awards are diluted to worthless. On the other hand many plants were awarded so long ago they've locked out any contemporary competitive interest. So maybe the judging review can be pared back to the last 10 years worth or so other meaningful time period to reduce the ancient awards history pressure.

2) I'm not convinced that judges should consider the commercial aspects of an awarded plant.

3) This is a constant debate amongst the judges themselves. They all have different personalities that shine through in their judging styles. But yes I think there is a bit of a push to look at plants more optimistically. Part of this may be due to the shaky financial position of the AOS and need to get the membership at large to increase participation.

4) I don't go to the judging center enough to see a strong trend in this. In some ways its basic odds. The more plants a person brings in the more likely a plant will pay off. Also the more frequently a person attends a judging, the more you can tell what they are looking for. And pre-screening the plants in the old AQ records helps too. But in my region I don't see the awards dominated by a handful of major commercial players.

 

[Gcroz]

4) I don't go to the judging center enough to see a strong trend in this. In some ways its basic odds. The more plants a person brings in the more likely a plant will pay off. Also the more frequently a person attends a judging, the more you can tell what they are looking for. And pre-screening the plants in the old AQ records helps too. But in my region I don't see the awards dominated by a handful of major commercial players.

Thanks for your input. Here is the problem, I, and many others, do screen based on AQ, but with many old awards and a general lack of consistency, in my opinion, it's hard to decide. A plant in one center that gets denied an award may get an AM in another. Plus, couple that with a recognizable name and I thin there is a presumption of quality. Judges are supposed to be neutral, but they know who presented the plant!

 

[littlefrog]

Sometimes we know who brought in the plant, it doesn't take too many decades to figure out who grows what. Although I've been fooled plenty of times. I take pride in not letting my guess about ownership effect me in any way. In fact, I could easily judge my own plants impartially, I think. The bigger players get more awards because they bring in more plants...

I am neutral on parallel (I call them lateral) awards. Sometimes I'm for it, sometimes against. It depends a bit on what I'm judging. If it is the 300th Paph. St. Swithin in the system, I'm going to be pretty hard to convince. Something with just a few awards, I'll be easier to convince. I think we need to get a good representation of the variety of any given species or hybrid into the award literature, and don't mind focusing on what makes that particular plant different or appealing.

I tend to judge as deductions from 100 rather than additions towards 100... Actually I think I might not even do that... I tend to look at a plant and after doing the research I know where it will score (in my opinion, of course). If I think the plant is an HCC for color, my color scores are going to reflect ~75% of the points for color. My final score will thus always reflect my initial estimate of the score. Sometimes I surprise myself in the pointing, coming out a few points higher or lower than I had estimated. I look pretty closely to see where those extra (or fewer) points came from, it is often a mistake.

I don't think I have ever given any consideration to the financial impacts of an award, positive or negative. Never crosses my mind. I don't think I'm just saying that, it just really doesn't ever hit my conscious thought. Of course now I'm thinking about it, and it will make tomorrow's judging interesting...

Rob

 

[cnycharles]

I have seen awards at our shows mixed between some of the vendors, and excellent individuals. Often bloomfield orchids gets awards but they have most of the really nice paphs, and can screen their plants, so it makes sense

 

[SelectOrchids]

in short, the RHS awards stand valid for some decades. Most am or fcc from the 50s are still the same or nearly so today... The AOS definitely not.

One more point given the price to pay once people get award would be virus testing too. I have seen quite a lot of virused awarded plants over the years.

Last, scoring a plant to know if it is worth an award is pointless. You see the plant, estimate the award and done. With the point scoring, it is clear that some plants get undeserved awards.

Things like that fcc mem rex van delden are simply a joke, and lower the value of all awards. At a point the TIOS in Tainan wondered if aos judging was worth it, but nonetheless some exhibitors refused their plants to be judged...

 

[Finrod]

Last, scoring a plant to know if it is worth an award is pointless. You see the plant, estimate the award and done. With the point scoring, it is clear that some plants get undeserved awards.

Good point. The way I see it any judge half decent judge should know in his or her own mind if a plant is worth an award. After the appropriate research if unfamiliar with the plant of course.

On the other side of the coin. Too often have I seen plants I have considered worthy of a mid to high Am relegated to Hcc status or worse still nothing.

One of the perils of starting at 100 and deducting. Although I have to say I see it happening less these days.

However we still have judges in our system wouldn't know a good flower even if it bit them on the backside. This is just from personal experience over the years.

 

[cnycharles]

we have pretty good judges that come to the shows in our area. that said, like finrod points out, just because a person has gone through training to become a judge and spends the time, it doesn't mean that they are going to be any good at telling the worth of one plant over another. some people have 'the eye' so that they can look and know award quality; others don't have the eye and need a point chart. it is interesting to watch at our shows when one of the judges has an interest in a group of species and is trying to point out particular positive points about a certain plant, and the others that may not have any experience just don't get it and may be uninterested in listening. it really does pay to have judges who know a particular group to judge that group, as long as they are 'death sentence' judges who feel that since they 'know' a certain group, don't over do it and be very over-critical of the plants they judge (so that nothing gets an award)

I wonder if somehow the lead judges in a center where something gets an inordinately high award, are ones who aren't familiar with the group that is being judged, so don't realize that it isn't as good as they think. all judges are volunteers, which is important to remember, and though sometimes there are funky plants that get awarded, we all have bad days . It's just odd that a whole judging crew would have a bad day all at the same time, unless at a big show the judges are split up into little crews and something is happening like where there may only be two judges awarding a particular group, they aren't familiar and may be in a hurry to get things done

 

[Gcroz]

Thank you for your responses.

I agree that the big players contribute more plants and thus get more awards. However, on several occasions, I have seen plants get awarded that were of inferior quality, owned by big players, to plants of the same type owned by "little guys" that were not awarded. Thus my statement that there is a presumption of quality from the big players. Unfortunately that plays back to the issue of parallel awards and make it that much harder, or impossible, for those "little guys."

Obviously, the system is not perfect. However, to play devil's advocate, wouldn't it be better to award plants that are worthy of the award no matter how many have been awarded in the past? After all, it's flower judging, not grex judging. Just sayin'...

 

[NYEric]

The AOS judging system is Perfect. You are quite welcome to quote this at my student judge interview.

 

[tim]

if you are concerned about judging, and you are interested in orchids, why don't you forget those excuses and become a judge. I did, I'm in Boylston, and I would welcome with open arms another person interested in bettering the system and dealing with some of the supposed and actual problems at work within it.

For example, did you know there was a heated debate about judging that Chiu Hua Dancer at the CAIOS show? Did you know that there is a significant about of discussion about things from other centers that should or should not have been awarded? Maybe Thanh supplied paperwork with his awarded plant? It's impossible to know the entire story of lots of this stuff without actually being a judge. I like to think that as a judge I can help fix some of the problems...and maybe that's naive, but it is more proactive than complaining for me. I find myself agreeing with most of Rob's points, and I think many (but not all) judges are in the same boat.

 

[Rick]

Last, scoring a plant to know if it is worth an award is pointless. You see the plant, estimate the award and done. With the point scoring, it is clear that some plants get undeserved awards.

That's how the dog show people do it. One judge no scoring. Total mess, smacks of politics and favors.

I really like the multiple judge scoring method to bring some semblance of impartiality, discussion/debate, and compromise into the decision. If there are a lot of judges at a center it's a good idea to change up the teams so that the smaller groups don't get into the same rut/view of the plants (no "group think"), and reduces the friends and allies stampede.

I've watched some group dynamics and noticed that there is always one judge who really loves the plant and promotes heavily in the discussion, and one who really doesn't like the plant. And the other 3 or so are neutral. By the time the research, counts, measures, views, and associated chatter is done, the score is generally based on how well the "promoter" has sold the rest on the qualities of the plant.

This may be one of the reasons why lateral awards just don't happen much, since boredom for very common or popular plants just doesn't create enough enthusiasm for any one judge to expend enough energy for effective promotion among the team.

 

[littlefrog]

We judged a Chiu Hua Dancer today, actually. We had a bit of a discussion about whether it was 'legal' or not. Turns out it is. Not sure when that decision was made. We didn't award this particular one because of some flower issues. Nice cross though.

if you are concerned about judging, and you are interested in orchids, why don't you forget those excuses and become a judge. I did, I'm in Boylston, and I would welcome with open arms another person interested in bettering the system and dealing with some of the supposed and actual problems at work within it.

For example, did you know there was a heated debate about judging that Chiu Hua Dancer at the CAIOS show? Did you know that there is a significant about of discussion about things from other centers that should or should not have been awarded? Maybe Thanh supplied paperwork with his awarded plant? It's impossible to know the entire story of lots of this stuff without actually being a judge. I like to think that as a judge I can help fix some of the problems...and maybe that's naive, but it is more proactive than complaining for me. I find myself agreeing with most of Rob's points, and I think many (but not all) judges are in the same boat.

 

[Gcroz]

if you are concerned about judging, and you are interested in orchids, why don't you forget those excuses and become a judge. I did, I'm in Boylston, and I would welcome with open arms another person interested in bettering the system and dealing with some of the supposed and actual problems at work within it.

For example, did you know there was a heated debate about judging that Chiu Hua Dancer at the CAIOS show? Did you know that there is a significant about of discussion about things from other centers that should or should not have been awarded? Maybe Thanh supplied paperwork with his awarded plant? It's impossible to know the entire story of lots of this stuff without actually being a judge. I like to think that as a judge I can help fix some of the problems...and maybe that's naive, but it is more proactive than complaining for me. I find myself agreeing with most of Rob's points, and I think many (but not all) judges are in the same boat.

I certainly agree that Thanh may have produced paperwork for the plant. My point was that I, and others would like to know, and perhaps that should be stated with the award. I had the same hybrid awarded and had the award nullified (http://www.slippertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=16628&highlight=chiu+dancer). If the situation has changed, I'd like to know! If it hasn't changed, I'd like to know why one plant is eligible and others are not.

While some may see it as complaining, others may see it as discussion. I NEVER stated that judges did not earn their privileges, but as a member of the AOS, I am allowed to have my opinion. I was also commenting on information supplied to me by the AOS and other growers and noted that perhaps the situation had changed (see 4/21/2012 6:44 AM post "Perhaps the status of Chiu Hua Dancer has changed? Anyone know?"). If you'd like to see the email supplied to me from the AOS regarding the eligibility of my plant for award, I'd be happy to supply it to you and the readers here!(email dated June 29, 2010).

As for the impossibility of knowing "the entire story of lots of this stuff without actually being a judge" that is an issue which I think deserves its own discussion. I believe that you do not mean that there are secret decisions and discussions which judges are entitled to know the contents of and which non-judges are to remain in darkness.

Finally, Tim, my decision to not enter the judges "training" program came due to personal considerations of my life at the moment. That does not mean that I'm not allowed to discuss, "complain," or contemplate openly my opinions of the judging process. As noted elsewhere on this board, judges are not perfect, but they are also not exempt from the scrutiny of the orchid community. Perhaps there will come a day when I decide to enter the judging program. Until that time, I will gladly observe and comment on the system as I see it. I also welcome any judges to comment on my opinions and enter into discussions about those opinions.

 

[tim]

I never said you were complaining and I certainly never said you weren't "allowed" to say whatever you want about the system. I would simply contend that the easiest way to change an organization you think has problems, but also intrinsic value, is from within it. I'm sure all the judges would tell you that the training process is long and time-consuming, but allows us to provide a service to something we all think is worthwhile.

For example, perhaps to deal with your valid assertion that discussions be privy to members I might ask that centers have secretaries and minutes of the discussions of each of the plants to be published online or on the AOS blog or something. That might be great!

I think posting that email would be very interesting. It appears as though it is only within the last year that Chiu Hua Dancers have been awarded...trying to keep current with what can and cannot be awarded is an ongoing process for us.

 

[Rick]

I've watched some group dynamics and noticed that there is always one judge who really loves the plant and promotes heavily in the discussion, and one who really doesn't like the plant. And the other 3 or so are neutral. By the time the research, counts, measures, views, and associated chatter is done, the score is generally based on how well the "promoter" has sold the rest on the qualities of the plant.

I should add that during the coarse of research/debate, the promoter is often tempered in outlook too. The final score is an average of individual scores (straight math), but the range is narrowed and focused by the judging debate.

 

[Gcroz]

Tim, per your request, here is the relevant text from the email I received from Bob Winkley.

"It has been brought to my attention by Ron McHatton, Chief Operating Officer at the AOS, that Paphiopedilum gigantifolium (and its hybrids) is ineligible for AOS judging. Ron is also in charge of Education, Nomenclature, Research and Regional Outreach. Per his note to me on June 29, 2010:

'According to the US Fish & Wildlife, these (note: referring to Paph gigantifolium) are not legally in cultivation anywhere - yes I know they are for sale here ... but there is a disconnect between USDA which clears plants and F&W which enforces CITES. Since no plants of gigantifolium can trace their history to legally obtained material none of their offspring can either. This then makes it impossible to clear them based on the CITES exemption for hybrids of paphiopedilum. Also, the JC voted (approved by the trustees) that we are no longer able to judge any of the post-ban species and their hybrids anywhere in the world unless it's the country of origin and they are collected legally or they have been released into the US by a rescue center.'"

As you can see, my confusion over the legality of the plant, and awards, is grounded in this email (see also Orchids Mag thread in the Tell Me About It forum). Now, like I've addressed, this situation may have changed in the intervening 2 years.

This email also highlights the question as to whether AOS needs to be an "enforcement agency" for the USDA and USFWS. I contend that the issue of legality should not be considered when judging since I do not believe enforcement of laws is something AOS should be a part of. Personally, I think AOS judging should be able to award any orchid. But, I will add that I do see the other side of this as well!

 

[tim]

Thanks for providing that and sorry for your experience. I think the issue at work here is, just as you said, that when your plant was awarded, gigantifolium was not legal, and now it's been imported legally and it and its hybrids are legal.

Can you provide another example of an organization which implicitly accepts illegal products as a part of daily business?

I don't think it's an issue of enforcement - it's not like the AOS is going to take away an exhibited plant because it's illegal.

I think it would be wonderful if the AOS or other advocates for the orchid industry would do some lobbying on our behalf to grow these widely available, artificially propagated, "illegal" species. Hopefully as Holger (or others) brings more and more of them to the states it will become a non-issue. To the best of my knowledge there are no paph species which have not been legally introduced to the US at this point (perhaps excepting some little-known natural hybrid-ish or similar things).

 

[Gcroz]

Thanks for providing that and sorry for your experience. I think the issue at work here is, just as you said, that when your plant was awarded, gigantifolium was not legal, and now it's been imported legally and it and its hybrids are legal.

Can you provide another example of an organization which implicitly accepts illegal products as a part of daily business?

I don't think it's an issue of enforcement - it's not like the AOS is going to take away an exhibited plant because it's illegal.

I think it would be wonderful if the AOS or other advocates for the orchid industry would do some lobbying on our behalf to grow these widely available, artificially propagated, "illegal" species. Hopefully as Holger (or others) brings more and more of them to the states it will become a non-issue. To the best of my knowledge there are no paph species which have not been legally introduced to the US at this point (perhaps excepting some little-known natural hybrid-ish or similar things).

Tim, what then is the requirement to produce paperwork with plants. Is there still a presumption that the plant is illegal and AOS will require proper proof?

Also, what you imply regarding "accepting illegal products as part of it's daily business" does not necessarily apply to the judging example. Since the plants are not possessed, the "owner" still controls and keeps possession during judging, then the issue of "accepting" contraband doesn't apply.

If you'd really like to know some organizations around the world that do accept stolen goods, try going to museums in which antiquities are displayed. There have been many cases of stolen antiquities being found in the actual possession of museums.

Enforcement is perhaps the wrong word. I'll have to think about how to explain that portion of my argument more clearly.

 

[Gcroz]

To the best of my knowledge there are no paph species which have not been legally introduced to the US at this point (perhaps excepting some little-known natural hybrid-ish or similar things).

For my own curiosity, has Paph. canhii been imported legally? I think it is a neat flower and I'd definitely like to get one if they are legal.